ONE MONTH AFTER CAMDEN TOWN FIRE, AMY WINEHOUSE DIAGNOSED WITH SKIN CONDITION

Impetigo: A contagious bacterial skin infection, usually of children, that is characterized by the eruption of superficial pustules and the formation of thick yellow crusts, commonly on the face.

In London, everything burns.  Whole buildings look left and go 

Missing, the city’s soil loosening its grip over the streets.

Pavement falls and my skin goes with it—silly, how

Easy it seems now to develop the night, each fire a photograph of

Two or three things I once blessed, named.  Some say an

Infection travels for years unannounced, the way my voice

Grows suddenly some mornings when I’m awake and the air is 

Orange and evolving, my face a note to study, to touch.    

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DOCTORS WARN AMY WINEHOUSE OF FUTURE EMPHYSEMA RISK

Each doctor performs
the same dance,
moves across my lungs
and makes me hum

the lyrics. Let me
explain. The body
heals itself, but lately
it's grown bored. 

Even now, the throat
can't be coaxed: 
each breath assumes
a voice, every

swallow a sentence
to smoke. You see,
the world expects
a circus before a cure.

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These poems are from a larger series on British musician Amy Winehouse. The titles are inspired by recent newspaper headlines and the poems are written as a reaction to those headlines, a sort of tabloid 'call and response'.