A poet might write your arms shine.
Birch bark “silvered o’er”
Livid flesh, tense through tight skin
Slits.
             But to me you are the vivisected girl.
                          How objective you are,
                                       Filming your self-dissection to upload, where?
                                                     Paring skin, fat and veins with such gaping
                                                                    Concentration.
                                                                                 You ache to know,
                                                                                             Will the tender blade nestle
                                                                                                           In the shivered V?

After bleach cocktails and paracetamol swallowed
Like Parma violets
On a walk in the park 
You are interred. You call it cheerfully
The “nut-house”. Vivisectioned, you might say,
With your love of
Gallows humour.
             My vivisected girl,
                           Burst skin in bloody frets
                           Down biceps to filmy knuckles,
                           And you carved your elegy in your thigh,
                           “Weirdo” in upper case cuts.  

Fiona Becket works at the University of Leeds and is currently writing a book on visual poetry by women. She is interested in poetry on and off the page, in nonhuman environments as well as poetry in virtual or expanded reality. She recently published an article on electronic poetry in Judith: Women making Visual Poetry edited by Amanda Earle (Timglaset Editions, 2021).