top of page

THE ST(R)AIN

By Gemma Green



I ask that you keep me around as a courtesy

And that courtesy keeps me as pristine as she found me

Spry, and with a bundle of twigs clenched in my indigo fist

I ask that you see me as a trophy

All that I am is to be polished

And inscribed with achievement arbitrary

Looked after once every two months

Looked upon with a nostalgic eye and a pang of false superiority

I ask to be caught the same way heavy blankets of fog absorb tendrils of red smoke

Bathed in a wash of pallor and agony

Halved like an overripe fruit and discarded like birthday wrapping paper

Swiftly and secondarily to consumption

I ask to be told who I am

Imbue a direction to the evidently borderless shape of my mass

Timeless in yearning

Yearning to feel unadulterated joylessness once again

Without the burden of conscientiousness

bottom of page