Artifice is knocking

31st of January 2026.

Oh, artifice is come a’ knockin’,

without a face, or with a face that changes.

Here, I can do things quickly.

Now I get it. Now I get it.

This way of speaking is quite literally

at 1.5x speed. I am letting things out of the house

of my head quickly. The thresholds are

becoming a blur. And here is artifice,

coming knocking, coming to like

my poetry. And here is anonymity,

coming with a cheaply generated

cardboard cutout. This place is not a street,

or a park, or a town square. God forbid!

If it was I’d see you ejaculating into a sock

at a courtyard cafe,

and you’d look at me with glazed eyes

as I cartwheel by, stark naked,

staring at arses, staring at thighs,

holding a transparent napkin that I imagine

is concealing my shame. But it is see-through, hah!

So I can look at you, looking at me,

looking at you, looking at me.

Regression as far as the eye can see.

Oh, artifice is come a’ knockin’,

and it isn’t a happy knock. It is noiseless,

like the ticking of a digital clock.

If this was, in fact, a town square

I would be sitting at a cafe,

wearing a green shirt and blue jeans,

colourful socks and New Balance trainers.

I would be writing slowly

about the sound of someone’s heel

hitting the tarmac. The subtle crunch

of dirt and gravel as the shoe rises.

A grey sky without purpose.

A silver packet skittering across the floor.

People holding hands. People walking,

people holding entire worlds inside them.