On the first day of this godforsaken year
(I’d known it would be just that. I knew in the last few moments of last year.
The clock wouldn’t stop ticking and
Every step brought to our withered lungs agony more piercing than the last.
We staggered around, waving our fists about,
Begging for a stop. Aching for a want.
Trying to catch hold of anything golden, anything
Quiet! For once.
Anything that rested between the ticks of these dismal,
Godforsaken sundial sorts.
And I told everybody it would be just that, the next year would,
G-O-D-F-O-R-)
I cut my hair in the sink and proceeded to clog it.
On the second day I lost a huge chunk of my soul cleaning it out
(But it was ok because I knew someday I’d write something about it and some of it would come back to me somehow)
Anyway, I wrote something really pretentious
There was a mirror and a light and
God, those two words in the same sentence feel like a bellyache wrapped in a scream
(Because I don’t know what I am but I do know what I’m not)
And I’m not sure if
Starting ur sentence with ‘and’ is a poetic expression but
I really hope it is, I’m willing it to be because
There’s no words in my brain and far too many in my throat.
Manal (she/they) is an art history junkie and a self-proclaimed storyteller. Of the poem, they say, “this poem is about the perplexing experience of growing older and finding yourself on the way.”