The Pressing

There are some of us who chase after midnight.
Hypothesis: it is the unceasing compression,
bathypelagic, that makes the darkness feel familial.
But there are layers to it, as to all things. And we,
find thrills playing on the abyssal edge of them.
If we could only taste his blood upon the needle,
we need not chase the alluring phosphorescence.
The pressing can make a church of anything.
A nightly migration—call and return, but only just,
with half my particles stuck in the thermocline.
Descend far enough, self becomes languid.
On the cusp, one brushes with dominion—
then, only the hadal:
the trench floor,
flickering dissolution.

Patina

as if landscapes verdant,
both feral and radiantly ordered.
subject to consecrated gaze,
to be declared unhallowed.
to dispose of a once-used rosary.
they litter the city dumps
in their hundreds of thousands.
i am stained-glass silhouette,
pixel-flesh projection of sweetness.
salt drip to navel, slurped up
before becoming too profane.
forsaken in the baring of
wanton heat. to unfurl is
to pluck them momentarily from
sacred enmity.
scry upon my body
in its aftermath.
not your crucible —
only a temporal patina.
to attend to your acedia
will take much,
much more.

Kacey Martin is an emerging writer-poet, and academic of Māori (Te Arawa) and Anglo-Celtic descent. They live on unceded Gadigal land in Eora/Sydney, Australia. Their work has been published in PRISM international, Cordite Poetry Review, Rust & Moth, Tell Me Like You Mean It 8, and elsewhere. Kacey is a proud cat mum to Paikea and Rehua. You can find them on Instagram at @kaceymartinwrites.