Peter Scalpello
Stage
Parallel frauds puff thought into the conditional day, stoned on its light They can’t help but; Light gives the iris its truest colour
They as in plural, my shame and its shelter, though both themselves are multiple They as in the nameless I, a glint within silver parenthesis, or outwith
My shame and I in transit receive aroused messages from a silhouette You have the bodypart I love, so I love you To expose your fantasies without a face, then, is to be anonymous What of the internet is physical, has an appetite? I angle to read the screen in shadow of myself; The heart, like the world, whispers on
After not long, Shame is asleep The weather changes and sheep in the field behind stand back up, unable to tell who started it
We move towards and away from the land on which humans needn’t interfere, wrapping tyre tracks and blood drops ’round the Earth like string Biological anger and the quiet violence of passivity intersect and, meanwhile, truly I am so unappreciative of balance
We pass alongside a town where the buildings are covered in tarpaulin, there may have been a flood When I started giving in to desire, my life was washed too Have the fish here abstained from dance?
It all rushes back to the blackened eye Through the window I take a photograph of what isn’t mine, the image saves A catalogue of my flesh exists in a chip among cylindrical servers on the seabed; Isn’t it awful to be observed In photos I can see my feminine peeking through like a possibility
To have gender is hard To not have gender, also hard Today I can’t decide which I prefer For this, the word perhaps is trans
At what opportunity does a person choose to abandon their life? 12:04 is morning; 03:08, mourning I feel one become the other, as simply as somewhere else can be felt as nowhere
Recently I lay in bed for days with alcohol poisoning, losing muscle, softening my maleness through sickness A conversation with my immunity; I hear you, I’ll try harder to be real The fictions we tell ourselves, my addiction to identity
Back to the vehicle: Shame individualised, I the glowing interior shape of self, the journey we’re on towards an interesting resolution minus testosterone If memory is distance, how many miles are left until the truth of my own experience?
PETER SCALPELLO is a queer poet and therapist from Glasgow. Their work has appeared in Five Dials, Granta, and The London Magazine, among other publications. Peter’s debut collection, Limbic, is published by Cipher Press. Twitter @p_scalpello.