SurVision Magazine
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An
international online magazine that
publishes Surrealist poetry
in English.
Issue Four
NICHOLAS HAYES
If It Quivers
If it quivers on the desk in the
studio in the morning light, filtered through gray film on the window,
If it quivers in the gray amniotic sack laced with red veins and blue arteries,
If it quivers when your hand draws near to pick up the coffee mug you sat beside it,
If it quivers as it starts to leak ichor that soddens your paper causing the ink to run,
If it quivers, anticipating your touch, you know it was never truly yours.
A Minor Procedure
The appendix indexes itself. Solemnly placing itself in the file between appendage and apprentice, it knows it will be missed. It leeks through the cardboard sleeve. Pus and gore drop to the bottom of the cabinet. The lack of pain will make the body long for it. It is certain; it is certain. It wraps some fragments of appendicular artery around itself like a scarf before crying itself to sleep.
An Exam
Gossamer clogs the arteries of a middle-aged man. Cardiologists use machetes to clear a path through the aorta. They proceed with trepidation feeling the perilous weakness in the ground thanks to an aneurysm. One missteps and their boot breaks through, dangling in space. But he is pulled through safely. They continue cutting their way to the heart. An irregular murmur makes them feel uncomfortable. They are relieved by a sudden chill. They are only hearing ghosts and not a defect.
If it quivers in the gray amniotic sack laced with red veins and blue arteries,
If it quivers when your hand draws near to pick up the coffee mug you sat beside it,
If it quivers as it starts to leak ichor that soddens your paper causing the ink to run,
If it quivers, anticipating your touch, you know it was never truly yours.
A Minor Procedure
The appendix indexes itself. Solemnly placing itself in the file between appendage and apprentice, it knows it will be missed. It leeks through the cardboard sleeve. Pus and gore drop to the bottom of the cabinet. The lack of pain will make the body long for it. It is certain; it is certain. It wraps some fragments of appendicular artery around itself like a scarf before crying itself to sleep.
An Exam
Gossamer clogs the arteries of a middle-aged man. Cardiologists use machetes to clear a path through the aorta. They proceed with trepidation feeling the perilous weakness in the ground thanks to an aneurysm. One missteps and their boot breaks through, dangling in space. But he is pulled through safely. They continue cutting their way to the heart. An irregular murmur makes them feel uncomfortable. They are relieved by a sudden chill. They are only hearing ghosts and not a defect.
