Mark Czanik
Self Portrait
I wrapped myself in a wire-mesh suit,
got a friend to knead and squeeze the frame
then cut me free with secateurs.
Packing the body with diary pages
I tied it back together into shape,
embalmed the shell with black wool and scrim.
Goth wig, fingernails, lipstick, rouge.
A child's glasses broken at the wing.
I gave it a bulletproof vest of comics
and carried it sleeping to college.
You don 't know what this is, my teacher said,
crushing a cigar beneath his shoe.
I took it to the ash-heap in the garden
tied in a bin-bag and warning tape.
The dustmen wouldn't touch it.
So I carried it to the attic where it sat
warmed by a chimneybreast,
next to the schoolbooks and games.
The head shrank imperceptibly over years.
The trainers curled and stiffened.
Eventually, the nose caved in, an eye closed,
a shoulder shawl of webbing formed.
White shadows began to appear
on the neck and arms, something on the hand.
I even go to it sometimes and kneeling
lift its clay face by the chin,
wonder at the bloom of mummied cheeks,
the butterfly stitch hovering over an eye,
reach through a gap in the ribs
to pull out another clue.
Page(s) 47
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