Four Poems

I believe in malice

Malice is not a force

Malice is a form. It is a form the way drama is a form. If I see a gun on page one then by page twelve I know I am in the wrong section of the library. If something dramatic happens to you, find something to do with your face. If in good company you encounter tapas too big for one mouthful the only solution is not to begin to eat. Etiquette is a bastard but it is our bastard, at least if it is our etiquette.

Malice is conservative

Malice is conservative because desire is conservative. I do not want a new world I want a world that will sustain the life inside me its macramé clubs its waterways its so to speak structure and so to speak base. No poem works toward a future utterly unlike itself, no paper works toward any future at all. /s and ( )s in a title create ambivalence an ambivalence which on contact with a peer reviewer spins prettily and sits itself down.

Malice is not personal

Malice is the defence of a world inhospitable to me only in ways which please me. In which I can say nothing has happened that I did not in some wise enjoy. The enemy is not a target the enemy is a test case. Malice is owl shit in the rose of whose garden. Malice is a memory palace and a place to keep it I’m not lost. I’m remembering this desert for later, when I want to be lost.

Malice is behovely

Malice wraps loving thoughts around unlovely things. Is a meaning that gives us force. When we use malice it is possible to think Vidya Naipaul’s virtue matters to us. It is possible to think I hope his cock drops off and not just eurgh Vidya Naipaul’s cock. Malice fluffs up the edges of philosophy, cleans under our nails. It crisps our tastebuds nicely. Malice puts toddler-safe grips on the unwieldy power of any old thing.

Malice is not unattractive

Bitterness is unattractive. Bitterness is malice that has despaired of its aim yet returns alive. Ish. Malice is a phantom limb. Bitterness a zombie limb. An avant-garde novel gives up on getting a Quemadura cover and thinks oh whatever. Design by the author. Photo by the editor. Children by the editor’s wife.

Malice is undifficult

By its tone we know it is a story by its length we know what kind of story it is.

Or, malice nails the definite yes to the permanent no

When Barthes says go fuck yourself we know what he means.

Half the battle

We need to weaponise this poem.It’s an accelerant. What does it accelerate. You.Technically, this poem does not exist.What did I say the poem was called. I didn’t.It never speaks. Why not. Doesn’t say.You knew it years ago, but it was a blonde then.It has a target in mind, one the French will never forget.It doesn’t kill women, but for you it will make an exception.Does it ever give up. No, it never gives up.It’s alive, and it’s moving, and it has the warheads.It’s quiet, too quiet. Get the kill switch. Whereare your manners. Our guest is hungry, invite it in.It’s already upset. Maybe it responds to Celtic.Maybe it isn’t trying to escape. Maybe it’sheading somewhere—somewhere with a lot of metal.This will only hurt a little. What comes next, more so.

We’re watching a person in a bear suit right now

Dear Kendall, hello. It is 05:15 a.m.in Singapore, where I am not, and I have it allfigured out: hurricane or no the pier crashing downis a pier and the waves are waves

but it is terribly unusual to be a personat any time and especially in that bear suitat that time and in that place. Who’d choose itis a man who could...