2021, vinyl on wall. 31 x 96cm.
2021, vinyl on glass. 59 x 32cm.
she hauls back her sodden hide and
each splintered edge hastily retreats.
having trickled slowly for some time,
it is tough to drag back every perimeter.
2019, 1 sheet of wrapping paper with printed text, 21 x 29.7cm. Exhibited as part of the installation, As It Is.
Engorged and Ignored
I do not know which spot to sink my fingers into
Or where exactly things can seep up from below.
Empty corners reek for wanting.
I want to lay down my flags and mark out where the hesitation lives.
It takes nothing for the dust to swell,
Only one murmur.
Likewise the sheets twist and buckle when I need them to stretch over me.
Some have started to crash through into the floors below as others
whose insides were dismantled drift towards the gaping holes in the ceiling.
The lifeless and burdened
the engorged and ignored
battle to bleed into the walls.
2016, 18 pieces of coloured paper with printed text, each page: 21 x 29.7cm.
Below is the poem, Darling Prune, each verse of which was printed faintly on eighteen pieces of paper. These were placed upon a shelf where each viewer was welcome to look through them.
Darling Prune
‘So’, she thought.
‘Let’s not be lazy.’
Let’s strip the sheets
And rinse them dry.
Her thoughtful itch
Knows this next lie.
Mmmm
She spread her hand
Across the cover,
So tight it stretched,
Course, it’s no bother.
Each crease is spread,
Taught and bare.
No room to breath,
Above the lair.
Well done, good girl.
How firm and neat.
Now introduce me,
To your meat.
Beneath the hills,
Beneath the moors,
Beneath the valley,
Beneath the shore.
‘Well, good morning!’
She said, her manners impecible.
Laid out so well, young
Prune, how sensible.
A grumble announced
Her greeting had been heard.
Of course one fell forward,
But only slurred.
It’s more than the shivers from the heap next-door,
And the sniffles from the innards stacked on the floor,
And better than the nudge from those more discreet,
And the whisper from the one that beats.
What a sight to behold,
Her flesh, her hoard,
Fed each day,
By the untoward.
Hmmm
But what to add?
What do they need?
Who has been bad?
Which shall be freed?
A nudge pointed her.
Oh yes, she was right.
Her heel had been dragging
As usual, out of spite.
So she gnawed the gift
Into its wrapping.
What a relief,
No more tapping.
She bids them farewell,
And hops up above.
A pat on the back,
Wait, what was that shove?
Oh it swivels inside sockets,
Under the sheets.
She does clamp it so shut,
Yet her sight can’t retreat.
A careful bark
Beneath the shuddering.
An organised expression.
Slain atop the hollowing.