Poor Girls
Molly knows full well
that broken ladies
should be seen and not heard.
Knows to let slow aching drips
slip down behind clenched fists –
no outward signals here! – and
Molly walks home on summer nights
gripping expectations
in yellow teeth that crack – and
crunch! – with every last
piteous step and yet
Molly knows how
to hide bruises.
Sews them into patchwork;
admires the blurring seeping
of it – the pretty colours! –
so nice to look at
so clean –
Antigone in the Cave
Split hairs – sputtering throat –
tangled fibres – spitting breath –
oh gods, teach me how to die
how to make it beautiful
(there’s no beauty here,
down here with the dark, the scraping)
just a little longer. Then I’ll be off.
I heard it feels like flying,
but I doubt it.
My hands, my hopes are all
rising, dear one,
don’t you know this was for you?
Maybe one day there’ll be a girl
dying honestly out in the sunshine,
but it won’t be me.
Room
I look out over our distance,
two days since a discovery
that you can, in fact, be a voyeur
in your own past.
There we are, locking ourselves away,
sharing tattered quiet longings.
Buried things, unspeakable,
unearthed in these four walls
when they stood outside time.
Florence Walker has been writing creatively since primary school, with a recent publication in The Mays Anthology. Frequently panicking over her next assignment, she also indulges in LARPing and musical theatre. She is currently studying BA English Language and Literature at Oxford University. Photography credit: tgarnett.com