After Neighbourhood #2: Laika by Arcade Fire
Exhibit: C
You don’t see how I see - how I saw this Earth's sphere: colours -
All-and-sundry for you but for me all was sepia. Dour
And a face at the glass – tongue-out, snouted. See-through
And through? No blues and teals, but electric twinkles; pretty
Static flickers of cities; stars inherent one in each eye, dazzled
And oh howl, a glow enfolding, bright holder; haloed.
And I to you – a creature too? A stray to you, I was prey to you: fodder
To a mission. When you made the decision, a bark on my behalf?
I bow. Maybe I’m sour about your control; power
can command your hand to hurt a fly, if you’re stronger
I know I know I know, I do; if you need something, you rummage
I know, it’s not me, not personally. You’d just seen me and...Taken.
Am I see-through too? Looking up at you I’d have smiled – if I’d been able to
Exhibit: B, Papers.
Just papers rustle the proof I existed. They whistle my fate - Flimsy.
Like listening memory: Up on high, way on high, only my whimpers
sound so inflected I might have swallowed my own notes; unheard
Well, I would tell how: whisked from streets where I, feral, fended,
And jettisoned. Befuddling technology blinking; wires
Checked when my ears flicked (curious) and then pricked (spurious) then: terror
(Unreadable) set in by day two.
Exhibit: a
lead, clipped to tagged skeins of rope; pewter.
Caught, they fed more rope to choke my sprint; master.
Blank statements and gestures suggested adventure; space-walk
Then a warm palm deigned to grace my face, and I licked; Lapdog.
Wanted, I followed. The facility (my new place) was tight - sputnik
A shit-pit, cynically painted white with steel; circuits,
Computers flickered on quiet walls. Space-walls. Lights-out,
It felt a crypt (turns out, quite correct; most apt) I slept; alone
awaiting day one. It’s a shame there’s not enough
Space to take one small step.
