You keep my memories on a USB stick
and you bury my baby teeth in a sonnet.
But it’s more diversion than perversion
I don’t know how seriously to take this.
I wake up and my tongue is gone
I find it under the bed, I’m fine but
my mouth is so full of dust I can’t taste
for weeks. Four weeks, and already
I can’t remember another bedroom.
It’s ridiculous. You lock my hands
behind my back so we can watch GMB
in peace, I thumb the key I keep hidden up
one sleeve and do nothing but stifle a yawn.
You lock me in a dryer and I’m not sure
Whether to panic or not, baby which
would you prefer, you know how little
air I need, exactly, the science but do
you know yet if you want to hear my
frantic beg, my pummelling fists not even
denting that metal, or shall I not even give you
The satisfaction, curled up and calm until you die
of curiosity and rip the door open and I tumble
onto you pale and gasping and weak and grateful
the damp feel of my lips like licking an orchid?
Please, do whatever is best for yourself.
You step to the left, but I’ve always been a leaver,
myself.
***
Sophia Holme (she/her) is a queer poet and bookseller made in Canada but based in Oxford, England. Her work is featured or forthcoming in Southchild Lit and Not Deer Magazine, among other places. In her spare time she enjoys running, reading bits of several novels at once, and drinking a lot of coffee. Find her on Twitter @HolmeSophia
***
image: MM Kaufman
Rejection Letters 