Shadow eater
It leant towards me in the kitchen
as if offering itself,
the place where its mouth was
coming to meet mine inexorably.
But I managed a side-step
with a deft bite at the right ear.
It tasted of charcoal.
I was constipated all day.
The next morning I evened up,
took off the left ear. The nose followed,
the edges of uncombed hair,
the biscuit of skull.
Within a week I was lightheaded,
a little euphoric, drifting
like a boat with its moorings cut,
in and out on the day's tides.
You tried to steer me, spoke my name,
pulled me by the hand,
but when I explained you let go.
Gravity bled from me.
I swallowed the legs to leave
the torso a headless blob,
a gingerbread man's body
discarded on a plate of light.
When I'd finished I walked on air,
my heart a small bulb pressing
at the paper thin walls of my chest,
knees and ankles lurching
through each ungrounded step.
At night I'd leave my body,
gather my wits in a comer of the ceiling,
peer down on the two of us and wonder
who it was you whispered to
as you stared into my eyes.
as if offering itself,
the place where its mouth was
coming to meet mine inexorably.
But I managed a side-step
with a deft bite at the right ear.
It tasted of charcoal.
I was constipated all day.
The next morning I evened up,
took off the left ear. The nose followed,
the edges of uncombed hair,
the biscuit of skull.
Within a week I was lightheaded,
a little euphoric, drifting
like a boat with its moorings cut,
in and out on the day's tides.
You tried to steer me, spoke my name,
pulled me by the hand,
but when I explained you let go.
Gravity bled from me.
I swallowed the legs to leave
the torso a headless blob,
a gingerbread man's body
discarded on a plate of light.
When I'd finished I walked on air,
my heart a small bulb pressing
at the paper thin walls of my chest,
knees and ankles lurching
through each ungrounded step.
At night I'd leave my body,
gather my wits in a comer of the ceiling,
peer down on the two of us and wonder
who it was you whispered to
as you stared into my eyes.
Mike Barlow is a visual artist living in Lancaster, regularly appearing in magazines and competition anthologies.
Page(s) 21
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The