Anna Fissler
Responses
I am here.
Full-grown, full-lipped, alive, pulsating.
My breath, hot, violent,
catches in my throat.
I see my face in the surgeon’s eyes.
It does not betray me.
I am grateful that he does not look away.
I need to fix my gaze on him, his eyes.
I want to laugh, moan, turn away,
but his eyes transfix me,
reinforce his words,
show me there is no mistake.
She squeezes my hand, the nurse,
holds it cupped in her own hands.
It is cold,
limp, strangely innocent in her healthy fingers.
I am dulled suddenly, changed.
The world is all at once tighter.
Full-grown, full-lipped, alive, pulsating.
My breath, hot, violent,
catches in my throat.
I see my face in the surgeon’s eyes.
It does not betray me.
I am grateful that he does not look away.
I need to fix my gaze on him, his eyes.
I want to laugh, moan, turn away,
but his eyes transfix me,
reinforce his words,
show me there is no mistake.
She squeezes my hand, the nurse,
holds it cupped in her own hands.
It is cold,
limp, strangely innocent in her healthy fingers.
I am dulled suddenly, changed.
The world is all at once tighter.
Page(s) 13
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