He walked the plains

in days of arid lust

his hands had held the worst of dreams and dust

and in the night he saw her glinting eyes:

 

a faery goddess, slender, lithe and bright,

with swathes of hair as fine and fair a mane

as no-one else could know. He deemed her his,

 

and left to make it so. He strode through woods

to find the maiden’s den. He cast his spell

like plaster on her limbs, and sealed the door.

 

Another shadowed thought then forced this beast

to tie her hair, and pull her tendons taught.

He tainted her, indulging sour dreams.

 

 

Enchanted times had turned to empty want,

the one she most desired drifted, changed;

the nights so hard that even hell denied.

 

The knots of rope still held her there, but greying,

split, and frayed, she pulled each hair, she broke

the chain, and left the golden kinks of hay,

 

strands of light turned silver-grey, from yellow

sun to dusty moon, the roots she kept,

and left his walls, his floor, his cage.

 

Stormy, rough, illiterate, her losing frown

with paint splats dulled to hide the nights before,

a warring heart, and hateful mind impure.

 

© Lydia Allison 2014

sad man

he told me

man

the man told me

she’s been rooerin

on the phone to her sister just fuckin rooerin

both fuckin rooerin

it’s fucked up man

 

then he starts talking something i can’t understand

and i feel this in my stomach, hard through like ice

but soft like life

and hot like life

and he’s talkin about the social, man

and anything else

samsara, man

and how it’s unfair,

and how it’s not unfair

 

and after i think about how it’s

unfair, man

not unfair

fucked up

and how i didn’t get the sad man

and how i didn’t know the sad man

and i told someone

and i told myself again

 

soon i’ll see the man

and i’ll see her

and it’ll all be so fucking sad, man,

we’ll smile and talk about last month.

 

© Lydia Allison 2013

Claws

It started at the fingers and grew.

More changed than grew, she said.

The cuticles spreading up out over blunt nails

thick cracked and callous and she tried to bite it but made it hard, dry as tree bark.

Each cut made a scab, each scab

a wave, raised and spreading –

 

she chased the new breaks with fingers swollen to claws

cracked skin showing liquid flesh

that leaked out and set black on her shell –

 

Every scar she had filled out to white blisters more like bone

busting out in flowers shouting everything she’d tried to hide –

 

I did that when I was afraid in a dream, to make it fade.

Did that when you were next to me in case you’d see.

That because I wanted more than black court shoes to say you’d gone:

I made  a seam to break the paint-thin layer of skin –

 

Joints shift with slow juts of movement,

nudge by creaking nudge;

raw air that seals like a cautery.

the back splinters as she curls herself closed to a pinpoint

the centre of the snail’s spiral

the numbness of fossil and bone.

ArtiPeeps

.

Lydia Allison our ‘Writer In Residence’ for the month of October.

..and a new Halloween Monster !

‘I often just write what I feel. I have a real interest in physicality/beauty/deformity as I think image impacts on everyone.  I’m particularly interested in how people see themselves and how that influences their appearance or physicality subconsciously/metaphorically in terms of their feeling or actively by self harm/eating disorders. And I’m interested in perceptions of beauty and body dysmorphia’.

____________________

Happy Halloween Everyone!

And to celebrate we’re not only offering you Lydia’s final poem focusing on deformation, specially written to pull the project together but also a new monster formed out of all the  poem illustrations by the artists involved in this project who have been inspired by Lydia’s poems.  You probably  haven’t seen anything like it before! This has been created by Sara Mena (you can see the image she…

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scars

like lapped scum from waves

fish scales the shape of nails digging flesh

 

soft grey of freed blood

fractured veins

lightless shadow under skin

 

weight of sleep and sheets

a mercury circle of brine slides from one eye

to the other

 

swollen face of a stranger

empty body full of colour

 

she carves her fingers over arms

brands them with raised lines

like child’s writing

white on pink

fake letters printed on raw skin

 

tiny dots of red ink leak to the surface

beading miniature eyes

that she wipes with her palm

pushing hard where it stings

then stops.

ArtiPeeps

 Lydia Allison our ‘Writer In Residence’ for the month of October.

..and the ever-changing Halloween Monster !

‘I often just write what I feel. I have a real interest in physicality/beauty/deformity as I think image impacts on everyone.  I’m particularly interested in how people see themselves and how that influences their appearance or physicality subconsciously/metaphorically in terms of their feeling or actively by self harm/eating disorders. And I’m interested in perceptions of beauty and body dysmorphia’.

____________________

Here’s the fourth of five poems on deformation by Lydia Allison illustrated this week by artist Sara Mena.  You’ll also find the third instalment of our ever-morphing, dastardly collaborative monster. This drawing is being collectively produced and passed from artist-to artist week-by-week- all contributing to one image.

The artists collaborating in Lydia’s project alongside Sara have been Gary Caldwell (whose art work went out in our first post here) and Amanda Santos

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Cauliflower Heart

You see them, don’t you?

These little scars just below

where my bra sits?

In the right light they shine like new

You noticed my fingers

blackened at the tips

nails hard

feeling gone

 

I know, I’m trying not to slouch, but

can’t you see the ropes?

Woven thick

and reaching

down?

All these tendons from tired knee

to toe are old rubber bands

I can’t reach any more

stretch          leap          fall

best foot worn

 

these stitches run like ladders pulling holes

but not everyone can see like you

they see: red wine purple teeth

cheshire cat grin

 

but not the split fruit skin,

and under it all

the hard tissue grows.

 

ArtiPeeps

 Lydia Allison our ‘Writer In Residence’ for the month of October.

..and the ever-changing Halloween Monster!

‘I often just write what I feel. I have a real interest in physicality/beauty/deformity as I think image impacts on everyone.  I’m particularly interested in how people see themselves and how that influences their appearance or physicality subconsciously/metaphorically in terms of their feeling or actively by self harm/eating disorders. And I’m interested in perceptions of beauty and body dysmorphia’.

____________________

Here’s the third of five poems on deformation by Lydia Allison illustrated this week by artist Diana Probst (See her biography below). You’ll also find the third instalment of our ever-morphing, dastardly collaborative monster. This drawing is being collectively produced and passed from artist-to artist week-by-week- all contributing to one image.

The artists collaborating in Lydia’s project alongside Diana are Gary Caldwell (whose art work went out in our first post here) and 

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blood gold

it drags the veins as it flushes and trudges

heavy and sludgy, it reminds you

of energy and time and waste

 

it weighs

and stretches the fibres

the skin

until she is numb

and unable to see

the leaves that shimmered

now gather around the rich tree root trunk of her heart

like cholesterol snagging in corners

and shutting valves like doors.

 

the key

a bright speck that navigates the brain

or abides in the green retina of the left eye

he noticed once

 

and hurts? can you not know?

 

it hurts

it makes her shine

and now it pools

a small dam low

in her chest

 

it pools

small sac by sac

so when she breathes

it’s cold and half dead

and tastes

like blood

ArtiPeeps

 Lydia Allison our ‘Writer In Residence’ for the month of October.

..and the ever-changing Halloween Monster!

‘I often just write what I feel. I have a real interest in physicality/beauty/deformity as I think image impacts on everyone.  I’m particularly interested in how people see themselves and how that influences their appearance or physicality subconsciously/metaphorically in terms of their feeling or actively by self harm/eating disorders. And I’m interested in perceptions of beauty and body dysmorphia’.

____________________

Here’s the second of five poems on deformation by Lydia Allison illustrated by emerging Artist Amanda Santos (See her biography below), and the second instalment of our ever-morphing, dastardly collaborative monster. This drawing is being  collaboratively produced and passed from artist-to artist week-by-week all contributing to one image.

The artists collaborating in Lydia’s project alongside Amanda are Gary Caldwell (whose work went out in our first post here) and Diana Probst and Sara Mena…

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Most people start with the skin

like back-washing a canvas

it is much easier to go brighter

or darker.

Try to remain as plain and smooth

as possible – make yourself

not like yourself

– do you want to stick out?

 

If they can tell you’re flesh and fibres

that you have pores

you sweat

think

eat mayonnaise

you have lost.

 

Learn to laugh

right

and to smile

right

how to talk

eat

who to like

OK

what to say

OK

 

and once you are there

consider all of them

consider yourself

disguised.

ArtiPeeps

Introducing Lydia Allison our ‘Writer In Residence’ for the month of October.

..and The Monster!

I approached Lydia a while ago proposing that she could maybe take up a month long residency on ArtiPeeps and to my delight she said yes! It was Lydia who then came up with the idea of focusing on notions of deformity as she had written a number of poems about it. When I asked Lydia the question, ‘why deformity?’, this is what she said about her interest:

‘I often just write what I feel. I have a real interest in physicality/beauty/deformity as I think image impacts on everyone.  I’m particularly interested in how people see themselves and how that influences their appearance or physicality subconsciously/metaphorically in terms of their feeling or actively by self harm/eating disorders. And I’m interested in perceptions of beauty and body dysmorphia’.

And this is what Lydia said about herself…

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Chalk

I want to coat you in patchwork

layers of heat,

too warm to burn

with knees bent sideways

and a small mouse head. Cradled,

to feed you milky tea.

Blue eyes open,

like an angel, you said.

No,

angels are red faced,

ethereal and dead:

you’re a present;

I’ll decorate you with bows,

and let daisy chains embrace

your head, chest, waist and toes.

 

I can put a hand on your swaddled shoulder

Let the fabric weight tighten and hold you

sleeping, you pout,

your lashes dust your cheeks like soot

on pepper-freckled skin;

one elf-ear peeks

hair spirals in.

 

I was afraid,

going with you to the nursery,
washing the cups with the grey dishcloth;

scared of who you might be.

I didn’t want to know.

I went though.

Those times lost

in your child’s memory

 

You want your hands,

so when I leave for more white tea

you shuffle loose the coloured squares,

escape the you-shape;

reach for me.

 

© Lydia Allison 2012

release feet from shoes

and all the rules

of walkie-talkie-buzz-twice-if-you-see-someone-with-a-rucksack tyrants

 

strip off the shirt that hurts

your heart and worse

that calf-length skirt

 

feel feet on floor

and slam the door like it’s that cow’s head . . .

slide into bed

eat some lindor

and tell your mum you’re too busy to talk

 

kettle on.

listen to the escaping steam scream

and to your heavy sigh-breathing,

not proud to help.

 

© Lydia Allison 2012