‘Corner’, ‘Sinned’
Published in Breadfruit Mag | 2022
Link to the online magazine here.
I met the creator of Breadfruit Mag, Olivia Simone, at a writing workshop in London. I enjoyed writing with her and talking about writing together very much. I had the below two poems selected for her magazine - both spurred from surreal and concerning nightmares I had at the time. They feel graphic and violent in nature, and made me reflect on how much truth lies in our dreams and subconscious. Is this the real me? Do I really want to commit such acts? The horrific reality of worldly conflicts and heartless violence permeate our media channels, and sometimes I cannot escape those images even when I close my eyes.
Corner
I dream about smashing skulls into the corners of tables
but last night I didn’t
last night I dreamt the bodies were already wrapped up, with packing tape, the brown too-shiny kind, the threaten to rip-at-any-second type
and they were stuffed hastily into a too-large suitcase on top of all my favourite possessions
but somehow they stacked neatly with everyone else, quiet, murmuring,
there is no longer a difference between the once-alive and the once-dead.
something glints, meaningfully, underneath the crackling bodies
I exclaim in delight as I recognise them as forgotten clothes I once-loved
so I pull them out in a flourish.
who would be so silly to put all my favourite things in this suitcase?
isn’t it to be rid of? isn’t it to be parted with?
why would I ever want to let go of you? why would I ever need to?
a flashback pierces my skull this time.
I saw how my shin bone sawed off its head. I saw how my applied pressure made their eyes bulge out, it was almost comical (but I don’t laugh).
so we have a history... we did so much together... didn’t you laugh with me at the point of
contact? (you laughed your head off, and I offered one in return).
but now you lie neatly with the other two and I don’t recognise you anymore.
there’s no blood on my hands
there is only the sharp corner of a table.
Sinned
had a dream about my teeth falling out again
but the dream was not mine
it is a common dream
a common phenomenon
plenty of us had our teeth shattered, torn, cracked,
falling through the foundations of our mouths as we hissed
in anguish,
I felt I would accidentally swallow them.
last night, they were abnormally large
I looked down upon them on my palms
and felt the weight of them against the world.
a derailing feeling
like I just extracted a bone from my body
to watch it disintegrate outside
to know that
I grew that
and get that
it’s not that
ground-breaking
to anyone else, but me
and so I weep for them
and bury them
with the previous ones
that shattered, upon impact.
and I give them one last grin
(sorry to keep you)
(sorry to wake you)
(sorry to make and break you)
forgive me, for I have