izzy

you are your own life raft
think big
no I said ‘BIG’
I meant bigger than that
hold your arms out as wide as you can and imagine that is as far as the world goes
put your mind to work and your body out to pasture
think about how you will keep yourself afloat
when everything around you is flooding

*

sarah

patchworking my way through cast-off t-shirts still smelling of you
i plunged the needle into my forefinger, bold as brass
fireworks of white bright pain popping behind my eyes
and that strange low puckering as agony flares
my fingers remembering bored art classes
sewing fine cotton thread into the uppermost coat of my skin
laughing at the horror of the girls to my side
immune to their dread, robed in secret knowledge
playing at the woman who sits here now, spurting blood like shame

*