I babble in the night,
throw out unknown voices
in sharp streams of ack-ack
that stripe my bed. I’m
a prisoner, abroad, shouting
someone else’s word for bread,
I’m a girl calling the name
of an angel, as she grips
the cracked pearls in her amulet.
I am not asleep, I am
drifting wide of the mark, on a
dark jaunt through my own throat.
And I don’t know if I sound
inspired, enraged, or both,
but I’m sure it’s the only way
to warn off the void when it gets
too close, although I’m not
so convinced that it listens.
Nina Parmenter’s first collection ‘Split, Twist, Apocalypse’ will be published by Indigo Dreams in 2022. Her poetry has appeared in journals including Atrium Poetry, Snakeskin, Light, Allegro Poetry and Ink Sweat and Tears. She lives in Wiltshire, but can be found online at www.ninaparmenter.com or on Twitter @ninaparmenter.
More work by Nina Parmenter
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