‘Helen’ by Euripides – by Andrew Sutherland

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Desire poems are an empty
a discarded mirror

Love poems are a gleaming
com and the rom

Just so you are aware: I have a double
out there. A god-made simulacra; cloud.

Whenever you were sure you saw me
watching down the war: that was the

illusion. It wasn’t me. I’m overseas.

Trapped in an upper hemisphere.
An unrelated country, doing

absolutely nothing. Airport
strike. A Helen of [blank].

I don’t understand this!!

I look at the photos of moments
I forgot how I looked but remembered

to take. The inverse thrill of
the present censuring the past.

I was never there.

Wide open mouth creeps in on itself.
The tongue shapes the way a person

carries on. Tonsils disappear into their own
forever. If only you knew I’ve been trapped

in this desert! If only you knew how this
desert’s a mind! Yes, I had a couple of tries

at lover. After acting school. Young, classical,
straight, but could no one believe my vows or

my grief? My little boy sweet; my side-
side-long cloud? I’m sorry: just know

I’ve been framed. Perpetual crime

I’ve been framed; here and this way. To be
the scene’s neighbour is a criminal thrill.

This is a misdirect!! A pyramid!! Now there is
only one boat!! And I don’t understand all this

talk of a horse. It’s exhausting

an invoicing thrill. I couldn’t convince you
at all. I couldn’t arrange my cloud

shame. I stayed in desire

when death was where I had just finished
looking. I wanted to change the world

with my being seen. The way
messengers rescue the drama.

And why your un-believing? I didn’t

cause this to happen. Oh heaven!
Oh heaven!! I wasn’t even there.

An easy mistake to make; in the horse,
in the ships, in the role, in the genocide.

But that was off-stage. But that was

a cloud. O god! he says. All of this
suffering for the sake of a cloud!
Is this

pain? A cloud passing by
with the day.

Image: Painting by Anthony Frederick Augustus Sandys (cropped)


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Andrew Sutherland

Andrew Sutherland (he/they) is a Queer Poz (PLHIV) writer and performance-maker between Boorloo (Perth) and Singapore. Publication credits include Westerly, Cordite, Overland, Running Dog, and EXHALE: an anthology of Queer voices from Singapore (Math Paper Press). His debut collection, Paradise (point of transmission) was published by Fremantle Press in 2022.

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