trade you for the collectible marbles by Keith Nunes

shaky footfalls, crisp new face asking me to wipe a mouth that’s been talking nonsense all night, golden syrup drip, dripping up the tie through the right eye spoiling the left-over tongue

toppled into a room full of echoing bones, wailing in the ceiling, islands waving with flippers stolen from cut-gut movie pirates

you grab the hepatitis, I’ll boil your socks and we can watch the wobbly bits invade the kingdoms below the equator

Keith Nunes lives beside Lake Rotoma, New Zealand. He’s a former newspaper sub-editor who has been published around the globe, has been commended in poetry competitions (means 4th), is a Pushcart Prize nominee and has been anthologised many times. His chapbook Crashing the Calliope is sold by the lunatic fringe.