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Artwork: The Flying Girl by Will Jacques
Remember You Were There
Alexis Child
The moon dreams at night of ‘if it had
only been’, sailing over the witch’s
house to dissolve the sky sleeping
in the shadows of a guardian angel.
The woman’s pillow gathers shapes
of a wingless bird whose weary
skeleton sings a song, proving fatal:
darkness through which we fall.
Moonlight, then daylight, recall
no face, taking you unprepared as a nail
driven into the centre of the world.
The lunar orb draws pentagrams,
resting in its obsidian vault, evoking
new worlds within its secret eye.
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Road of the Tongue
Alexis Child
As if separated from her body, her feet
move black in the day over the dust of
centuries, like a swarm of mosquitoes
through houses of fog. The shadow of
voices change like a snake uncoiling in its pit.
A paid assassin raises her hand, violent
fingers set traps for those who've ended
their wars. I execute this act, I've made
myself heard whispering for the dead. I am
powerful now, face to face with my own image.
The bloodshot heart of
the night has lost its
echo in a world that will not hear its screams.
The crush of hell gasps over its swallowed self,
happily strangled, shivering skin in a clear oblivion.
Dust be your savior, we drink glasses of
water until silence falls like rain, sharper
than forged steel against thunder's dark ears.
