Photo by Seyedeh Hamideh Kazemi on Unsplash
the dry-humored sky refuses to respect
the plasma of my pain. it smirks up its
sleeve at the leaks oozing from fresh
wounds, unwrapping a hot,
plastic sun to queer the lymph.
“they’re only paper cuts,” it sneers
denying humanity’s trauma. I’m not
surprised—life’s packaging mystifies me.
eyes creak wide open while the front door
doors of mechanized tissue-box
hearts click closed, guarantees
collapse like cardboard flaps
& locks snap shut on fingers. I can tell
when the physics of origami fold
against me. taste this papyrus—
it’s nicking my lips.
love’s paper petals detach
whenever its glue-stick goes into
shock. do the spirit’s deepest lacerations
ever congeal? you & I must decide.
you thought of something—
but we lost the vocabulary
for unwrapping compromise,
slicing our tongues each time
we tie the silver bow on a brand new
box of promises. I know I’m a half-
breed lesion: part gristle, part olive-branch.
cut & shuffle my secretions
into an epistle. like confetti,
we’re all in bits, existing only to be tossed.
kerry rawlinson is a mental nomad & bloody-minded optimist who gravitated to Canada from Zambia. Honorably mentioned in Proverse Press and Fish Poetry prizes, she’s placed in others, e.g. Bridport, Canterbury Poetry; Room; National Poetry Society and Palette. Recent work: Suburban Review; Topic Take Up; Grain; Freefall; Rochford St. Review; Prism Review; Event Poetry; Prairie Fire, and more. She’s still barefoot, still drinking too much (tea). kerryrawlinson.com @kerryrawli
