don’t light a cigarette
in a house of oily rags
if you do, be ready to
extinguish your reeky buns
‘cos methane doesn’t come
only from cross volcanoes
& farting has never been
an insured accident
so, eat way less baked beans
if you really want to live
or better, just stop smoking
go on a jet ski trip instead
by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2024
we are born
empty phials for memories
accumulated & preserved
for all time
drop by drop
warm & cold, sweet & bitter
laughter in sorrow & love
fumblers of rhyme
leaving’s never easy
but look, there, the stars
hopeful like our dreams
shade by shade
a unicorn’s funerary wreath
a pallbearer’s rainbow raiment
all is sublime
& then we die
caulked in eternity boxes
blest in rot for posterity
our burial heim
leaving’s never easy
but look, there, the stars
hopeful like our dreams
by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2025
your voice echoes back from yesteryear
as i perch on the edge of hope & fear
once more there’s this pang of you not here
the sun leers through cloud’s shame above
upon grounded white crow & black dove
whose answer for the wrong question needs love
tar soap scent atween the birches
your shadow no longer afore me
just othering eyes from briar to fens
your hand reaches through the fullness of time
untold happenstance of future clime
dusts sensate shoulder with earthly rhyme
it signals to turn that withered page
to uncloy myself from ferocity’s cage
release sweet sadness & fathomless rage
tar soap scent atween the birches
your shadow no longer afore me
just othering eyes from briar to fens
now & again when i turn to look back
i still see you not here & your hand’s slack
still you’re part of me on this doomen track
in these memories of you i abide
what remains of you the urn at my side
with no hope of turning time’s avian tide
tar soap scent atween the birches
your shadow no longer afore me
just othering eyes from briar to fens
by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2024
he gave me a shabby old pouch
filled up with pomegranate seeds
& i wondered what this could mean
how fertile he wished me to be
he showed how many seeds i got
as much as happy days are left
& i swore we’d marry right there
no priest nor church ‘neath nude sun’s haze
he squeezed a seed ‘tween two fingers
& the juice sprinkled his palm red
like virginity on crisp sheets
i did not even hesitate
by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2024
i am not your project
not in need of saving
to be restored from drafts
nor be redone from scratch
not a work in progress
nor a fixer-upper
not in your portfolio
nor part of your cv
so kindly fuck right off
you smug, self-righteous toff
look for another dunce
to suffer your ‘guidance’
by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2024
unbolt me 