Sympathetic - Conor Maxwell
It’s funny
seeing you in
white satin
In an azure sash
In a rush-laced corset
Backwards
because men wear it that way
It’s funny
seeing you bare
Sheer slip evening wear
cherry gloss lip stain
half a glass of scotch
Seeing you
smoking electronic nicotine
In a wrinkled shower cap
In fuzzy size tens
It’s funny
seeing you cry
Pinstripe waistcoat
Soaked in merlot
Soaked in sauvignon
Shattered wood
glass splinter sanguineous cuffs
southern country fowl
Tied yellow
with a little yellow bow
You’re a little yellow bow
It’s funny when
executions
Limp wristed regicide
Balmorals polished with
lacrima
urea
sodium
When
decorated soldier
christen virgin cleaver
soar rubber
citrus ligaments sever
at the ankles
When
ivory knuckles
tenderise human flesh
When she
cradles tongue
in a molar vice
Saliva violation
A flute of vomit
Load of fresh hundreds
between her breasts
It’s funny when you’re the gun
The safe behind the varnish
Chipped auburn paint
exposed wires
hi-Point 995 9mm Carbine
ten rounds
two dimensions
It’s only funny
because it’s you
Lux Aeterna - Conor Maxwell
Freezing
under eight jackets
on a street
where it never
fucking
snows
Sweat should not be this
cold
Vacuum-sealed
cheeks
and a
liquorice ironed fringe
war paint
one thin layer
your mother’s eyes
How
did you
not
learn
She said she wouldn’t fuck him
but the heat is out
this week
Pay for blow
in bruises
Sell your love
cunt
so you can
...
with him
All angles in a cerulean sweater
Room for two
at this rate
What will two heads get you
and how deep
do they have
to go
Misery is three colours
ending in green
Every night
the same time
thirty minutes before
bed
TV
is his mother
but not your son
One more serving of grapefruit
and salt
Double-dosage
so it tastes like mushroom soup
Ink
spilled outside the lines
Often blue
but never black
One sleeve too many
The television
is
off
Power surge on both sides
A serving of eggs
sunny side
somewhere
in a red dress
Leap of Faith - Conor Maxwell
I want out. I’m not fucking around this time. I can excuse the fact that I have a court-ordered roommate whose entire job it is to stop me getting into trouble. I can deal with living in a room that looks like it’s straight outta Silent Hill, but minus the sexy nurses and guys with pyramids for heads. I’ve even gotten used to having a 60” TV at my disposal that only has two available channels—Disney and Nick Jr. All of that is ufuckingtopia compared to what Happy Madison did to one of my favourite games. Me ‘n Happy Madison, my roommate/supervisor (his name is actually Brett) were about to play Noughts and Crosses on the back of the Manukau Courier and you know how crosses are pretty essential because they’re one third of the name of the game? Well Happy, he’s like “Crosses represent death and I need to steer you away from death-related imagery if you’re going to recover.” So you know what we played instead? Circles and Smiles. He even made me draw a circle around the smiles so they became happy faces. From a distance, it probably looked like we were playing Noughts and Noughts. It fucking sucked. I let him win.
In case it wasn’t clear, I’m currently in this programme for survivors of suicide attempts to get better and start loving life or some shit. You want to know what that’s like? Imagine having to slice your toast with a spoon and spread the Nutella with your finger because God forbid I ever come in contact with a butter knife. Last week I had a killer headache because I stayed up ‘till 4am watching Phineas and Ferb and Happy wouldn’t even give me any Panadol to make it go away. Apparently one Panadol is a gateway drug to more Panadol and after five or six headaches I’ll want to skull the entire bottle.
Oh, I forgot to mention the worst part! I’m not actually suicidal. No, seriously. I mean technically I jumped off a building, but it wasn’t like that. I was doing some hard core parkour like Ezio Auditore da Firenze from Assassin’s Creed II and while jumping between the Liquor King and the $2 Shop, I fell. Two stories, feet first onto concrete. The ambo driver that took me to the hospital was really hot, so I may have exaggerated the details of the fall a little. Told her I was a lone wolf, a rebel without a cause. Told her I was too mysterious and intense for this world, and thus, had decided to leave it. She wasn’t exactly impressed and next thing I know—Boom! I’m sent here. “For my own good,” apparently. I want out. I would just wheel my way out the door in the middle of the night if it wasn’t for the stairs.
I forgot to mention the wheelchair, didn’t I? Yeah, I’m in one of those now. At least until I get my leg casts off. Those fuckers itch like crazy. And they won’t even let me have a fork or something sharp to scratch under the mould when it’s a warm day and the heat makes living in these casts unbearable. I have to resort to using my toast spoon. The crumbs just make my legs itch more.
So I had this thought, right? The assassins, the ones from Assassin’s Creed (Ezio and Altair and the like), they do this thing where they jump off ginormous buildings and they land in hay bales, somehow completely okay. I was just thinking, in real life, you wouldn’t survive jumps like that. Not a chance. So what if the first assassin to try it wasn’t actually expecting to land safely? What if he was trying to kill himself, landed in some hay instead and was all like “Dude, what the fuck? How the hell?” and then his assassin buddies showed up and were like “Woah, that was amazing!” and he was all “Yeah, pffh, totally meant to do that” and from that point on it just became a thing that all assassins do? That’s just been in my head for a bit, don’t ask me why.
Anyway, that’s been my life for the last 14 days. I’m broken from the knees down (my junk still works, in case you’re wondering) and the TV and a handful of newspapers are all I have to keep me from blowing my brains out due to boredom. I’m not suicidal, that was an expression. Happy keeps a real close eye on me. As well as all the stupid restrictions I mentioned before, I’m never allowed to be in a room on my own with the door closed, which is fucking dumb, because when I turn the air conditioner on, I lose all of the coolness. And I definitely can’t masturbate. Yeah, you laugh, but I dare you to go two whole weeks without touching yourself because your supervisor thinks there’s a chance you might be into autoerotic asphyxiation. You know, when you beat off with a tie around your neck? I’ve never been into that, but after 14 days, I’d be willing to try just about anything.
I don’t actually want to die, but sometimes I consider eating the batteries in the back of the remote just to show Happy and the rest of the world that, with enough determination, anyone can off themselves with anything. I could throw myself down the stairs. Drown myself in the toilet. Watch Peppa Pig until my eyeballs melt. It’s easy enough with the right attitude. I want my butter knife back.
I’m not suicidal, but I wonder if they do parkour in Heaven.
Contributor's Note
Conor is an actor, writer, tutor and post-graduate student of English at the University of Waikato. His claim to fame is that he once defeated national icon Jason Gunn in a fist fight, but don't ask him about that, because he'll just deny it.