I mean really, why would being naked make him bite me? If anything, you’d think that being naked and free, reflecting the monkey’s nudity, all of us god’s fair children frolicking under the glorious sunlight – you think it’d make him feel more at peace with me, more connected? Yeah, well.

I never met god, but I met Jesus. He seemed like a reasonable guy. He told me that I’d done some things that weren’t right, and I guess that was true, I mean, he had all the facts straight. But he told me that he was giving me another chance because the rapture was happening pretty soon and if I learnt how to straighten up and fly straight before that point and repented the shit out of things then I’d be alright. I mean, he didn’t say it quite like that but you get the gist.

Anyway, he explained to me that what no-one tells you is that after you die, Jesus does his judgment thing and he decides if you’re worthy or not, but you get to see heaven either way. The thing is, if you’re not worthy, he shows you heaven, and part of hell is knowing that you can never, ever go there. And when you go to heaven briefly, all your friends are there, and all the animals are there, and your friends are lying in the pale sunlight on the soft, cool grass with some deer and a rabbit and some kittens and scorpions and you try to call out to them but they’ve forgotten about you and they don’t recognize your face and they can’t understand what you’re saying and they just laugh happily to each other like schoolgirls and then you go to hell.

The first thing about hell is that it’s not hot. People are all, ‘Hell is really hot, fire and brimstone, inferno, red things, etcetera’ but hell is actually much worse than that. When you get there, you need a jacket, and then after five minutes, you have to take your jacket off. Then it starts to rain, really hard, like needles, and then the wind picks up, and five minutes later you’re sweating again. And it just goes on like that. So you never know how to dress, you know?

And you’ve only got what you brought with you anyway, which isn’t really much, because it’s the spiritual world and you get a pretty tight limit and because it’s hell, the clothes that you’ve got are actually the clothes you recklessly bought in your earthly life that you’ve never really worn properly and always felt awkward in, so the jacket’s sleeves are too small and the pants are scratchy and you’re wearing a novelty hat and also a shawl you once bought in Thailand. All at once. Until it gets hot again, and you have strip down to nothing. But then you have to figure out where to put your clothes and everywhere is covered in a weird kind of goop that smells a bit strange, so soon your clothes get pretty goopy.

The other thing about hell is the apparent rationing of apostrophes. And everyone splits infinitives and no-one knows how to use a semicolon. Semicolons don’t actually exist in hell. But that’s not even the worst bit because the worst bit is that you’re the only person who knows the rules, and everyone else is completely convinced that they’re totally correct and there’s nothing you can do to change their minds. And all of the available surfaces – of which there are many, because hell is very cluttered with things – are covered in all the great novels of the world which are all written with the wrong apostrophes and split infinitives and no semicolons and someone is reading them aloud and pronouncing hyperbole, nuclear and library wrong every single time.

A lot of people think that hell is repetition, a bird eats your liver, Chinese water torture whatever, but actually repetition is kind of only part of it. In hell I think repetition would be relatively OK but what actually happens is that one part of your back is really itchy and this guy comes over and he scratches your back in one spot which isn’t quite the right spot, and then he just stops. Forever. He will never scratch the itchy spot. And it never stops itching. And every now and then they show you a video of him scratching your back, to remind you about it.

Because in hell you crave everything that you want, and none of it exists anymore. In hell there is no soft cheese, or vegemite, or toast, or hits of the ‘80s, or nailclippers or hot showers or butter or salt or taxis or two dollar coins or plastic bags without holes. There are no tissues or drinks or cigarettes or painkillers. There are no friends’ shoulders or long-awaited telephone calls or good test results or childhood toys, or warm towels or matching socks or unexpired buspasses or final puzzle pieces. There are no teenage bedrooms or memories of your parents. There are no pay rises or sick days. There are no smiles or hugs or kisses or caresses or hand-holding or gentle touches or sex or unbroken hearts.

But there are lots of pieces of paper, everywhere, and they’re ridiculously thin, and you stoop down to pick them up - and for some reason they’re not covered in the slime and they don’t even stick to it - and you try to hold them and read the really, really faint text that is written on all of them, but every time you pick up a piece of this ridiculously delicate paper, it slides out of your hand, and you can almost see what it says but you never quite manage to read it because the paper is too thin and light and mischievous and it flies away from you, and you never, ever know it but on every single piece of paper there are words written on it that will fill you with hope and happiness and warmth and completeness and beauty and truth.

And that is what I found I had taken back with me to the world, to help me for the rapture, one of those pieces of paper in the pocket of a pair of jeans I couldn’t have been wearing when I went to heaven, because I was naked, with the monkey, remember? But it was in there, somehow. But I was too afraid to read it because I wasn’t sure and I almost completely forgot about it until I remembered it and opened it, which is how I know, but by then it was too late.

some fictions are true, she says,

with a grin like a magician. not all of them,

she says, but some are. for example,

she says, pointing to a wolf wearing

the clothes of an old lady, asleep in a single bed,

for example, she says, this is true. also this,

she says, drawing my attention to

a young man leaning over a sleeping girl,

kissing her, softly waking her. that is also true,

she says. and of course this, she says, gesturing

to a girl in a beautiful ball-gown, big watery eyes

fixed on the second hand of a clock, skirts

bunched anxiously in her hands. of course

that one is true, she says, with a wry laugh.

what about – but she cuts me off,

laughing, no, no. that one is all made up.

and the one about the long hair, that’s

all lies too. it’s the one’s you don’t expect. i mean

this one, she says, climbing up a few steps

so we can see, far off, a knight in shining armour,

his steed peacefully nibbling grass

in dappled sunlight, this is half true. and this,

she says, waving her arm towards a couple

asleep under a sheet, bodies locked together

like held hands, this is true. she shows me

a woman quietly crying to herself

on a sidewalk in gentle rain, this is true.

she shows me a child lost

in a supermarket, this too is true.

she shows me a man walking

away without looking back, his face

all taut like cling wrap, this is true. i nod.

a group of teenagers jump off a cliff

and in to the ocean, screaming wildly,

thin like streamers, this is true.

i nod. a photograph of someone’s parents,

younger, more in love, i nod,

a woman waiting at the traffic lights, her eyes closed,

i nod,  a body caught before it hits the ground, i nod,

a man with his palms and forehead pressed

to a concrete wall, breathing, i nod, i nod,

this is true, this is true, this is true.

Inside brother’s stomach
I am curled up twice over.

Intertwined intestines,
knees knock elbows.
My fingernails have grown long and textured
like twigs.

Between his ribs and spleen
I rest my head, and when I blink
he says he feels butterflies.

Inside brother’s stomach
I close my eyes and hold on
from the inside.

An ache you’ve ignored:

Twin, my other,
I have always loved you.

(2008)

Lover, tonight I am Saturn

And you my circling rings

Saturnine, I find things tiring

Uninspiring, your body in

some languid repose

and mine –

dull, tonight, and I’m distracted by the stars.

Listen, I’m not worth running rings round

Tonight I’m not even solid.

This is how it works:
From underneath, the hook grabs the eye
And pulls the chain through the loop.
This forces the small, rough parts to collide and spark,
Thereby starting the pistons which
Drive the small motor which
Powers the weaving device that smoothly creates a textile
That wraps around the wheel-edge and creates a strong, tight canvas
On to which the magnifying glass, at only this certain time, captures the rays of sun
And concentrates them to burn through the fabric
Which then, torn, springs open with such force that
A small gong is hit by a nearby-attatched mallet
Which is just enough vibration to move the tiny, balancing pyramid of miniature wine glasses
That shatter directly on to a mortar and pestle (mechanised)
Which then grinds the glass down to roughly the consistency
Of smooth, soft sand
Which then is poured through a thin vein of tube
To trickle on to and weigh down one side of the see-sawing scale,
Which pulls down and thus also pulls the hook,
Which grabs the eye and pulls the chain to begin again this elaborate machine
That I have built because I do not know how to build love,
And in trying I have built this, for you, instead.

This city no longer electrifies me. Trains are just side-winding skyscrapers, repeated like grey suits on a grey sidewalk. There used to be shocks in the skids and collisions – now I’m biting on powerlines for the jolt that I need. Rolling traffic over my toes to make sure I feel it go past. Each zip code refuses me. I know the rhythms of traffic lights like my mother’s heartbeat and your face is one I’ve seen a million times before.

When I said I needed help moving

I was talking about boxes

But also your hands and my hips.

The sex was incidental, compared to what happened next. Compared to what happened when I put on my clothes and said I was going to leave, and he said with his hands, stay. He stroked my hair and the feeling of his palm on my forehead said, stay. He ran his fingers across my arms, down my back, behind my ears, over my knuckles, as if he might only have this chance to touch these parts of me, as if this might be the last time and he would have to remember it all in case I disappeared and he had to reconstruct me, and his fingers running across my electric skin said, stay.

It’s a sunny day when I rear-end your car and you come out to meet me to get my details. I notice that you delicately brush my hand for just a touch too long and as I write down my name and number on the receipt for dry cleaning you hand me I can feel you staring at me, at my hands, at my face, my undone shoelaces, and I can smell fresh petrol that has accidentally splashed on you. I nervously misspell my own name and give you the paper. You say, “I’m glad we ran in to each other.”

I took a dive under and through a wave, arching my back as I exploded at the top of it and flew backwards, falling on to its crest as it broke beneath me. The wave crashed in to the shore and tickled the dry sand, and then rushed back towards me.

As I touched my feet to the sand I felt my ankles dragging forward, water hands wrapped around them and tugging. The wave disappeared back to sea, to wander back in to the faraway parts of the ocean, to bounce off another shoreline and in to another girl’s arms.

She comes out of the ocean and later lays her head on his chest, her hair all fanned out across it. Her skin tastes salty from sea, and sweat, and she listens to his chest like a conch, for the sounds of waves breaking or softer, a heartbeat.