22:2

22:2 Abused Fingers

I pick and pick and pick

whenever I feel nervous.

(Which is all the time.)

I imagine a situation,

real or fantastical,

and feel my nails claw at flesh

chipping away skin from my tips.

Often I’ll be bleeding without realising,

a little trickle running down my thumb,

setting into the crevices and painting

my tone brighter.

It is unsightly, unhygienic,

but I can’t stop.

A scrolling advert on Facebook

will ease my tortured skin

when I order and receive two anxiety rings.

The silver bands are thin and plain

cheap looking to judging glances.

On each ring is ten beads

taking up only half the band’s width,

but mobile around its circumference.

Now restless fingers reach towards

the small spheres, pushing and separating,

grouping and counting.

I have one on each hand,

moving them to different fingers. My skin no longer bleeds.

22:1

22:1 Food Discrimination

I don’t do it from boredom or stress,

it’s not a way to distract.

Rarely is it even intentional!

I’ll be packing up some sausage rolls,

into four they must go,

but sometimes there’s a less-than-perfect one

and it is destined for the bin.

In my head I hear a little voice,

vulnerable and scared,

‘Please, I can’t help being misshapen,

don’t discriminate against me.

I still taste like the others, don’t deny me my purpose!’

I’ll hear it scream as I throw it away,

its weeping haunting me.

I shake and scream, ‘It’s not alive!’

before I continue on.

This happens also when I’m making sandwiches

and need to separate tomato slices,

only two are needed per product

and yet they cling to their neighbours.

‘Don’t do this! We’ve suffered so much already.

Don’t force us apart forever!’

And so I’ve broken families, lovers and friends this way.

I hear them cry out for each other as I do my tasks.

An overactive imagination, maybe,

a very distracting one.

One day, perhaps, I can just do my job

and not worry about the misery I am causing.

21:41

This was just a parody idea from a mistake I made in a different poem, where I made it sound like someone was marrying a castle.

21:41

She emerged, newly married to her beautiful home,

ignoring the bemused stares of their wedding guests.

The vicar, under pain of death, had stuttered

through the ceremony, joining a girl and

building in holy matrimony, till death do them part.

Many pondered what death would mean for a building

but didn’t utter their thoughts aloud.

Design a site like this with WordPress.com
Get started