perpendicularly askew
with frayed, peeling edges
like grandmother’s fingers;
yet buoyancy lives
as silicone cheapness,
floating on empty tides
and waveless seas.
Dust coats, submerges veneers
as overly polished ornaments;
I sneeze under grey,
muffling, muted sounds
eyeing the wear of canvas
showing Time’s stamp
as inked library books.
A blankness fades
camouflaging with routine:
senseless repetitive rhythms.
I calibrate to new drones,
spying beacons of eastern shores
that fly on sunlit wings,
soaring high as metal birds.
With time, beige impregnates –
sporting dots of colour
like Hollywood glamour:
cherry-lipped full,
a growing, endless smile;
rootless teeth that shine.
Time heals. It’s true. Eyes see.
Even the most distorted parts
replicate new skin as snakes,
pirouetting betwixt light and shade.
Conversely, enviable vampires,
long lost to ruinous rust,
rotate the rubble of lost minds
as gelatinous, dying tar:
infinitely lost to darkness -
no incandescent splatters
can enlighten their world
nor highlight an inky canvas.
Shards of tangerine splatter…
spread on my renewed silken face
as character grows – sight strengthens
with each daubed canvas brush.
Emma is a mother and English teacher. She has poetry published with and by: The World’s Greatest Anthology, The League of Poets, The Lake, The Beckindale Poetry Journal, Dreich Magazine, Drunken Pen Writing, Porridge Magazine, Visual Verse, Littoral Magazine, The Pangolin Review, Derailleur Press, Giving Room Magazine, Chronogram and for the Ledbury Poetry Festival. She also has published a number of short stories and her first novel, Shelley’s Sisterhood, is due to be published shortly.
How many women over history have either been silenced or not recognised in their own right for great discoveries and achievements?
The answer to this is sadly: many.
Shelley’s Sisterhood explores such women in fictitious Victorian London. Ida, a budding scientist, and her fellowship of similarly minded ‘Sisters’ find and discover the means for modern surgery to be what it is today. They trial and develop anaesthesia and antiseptic in the shadows of supposed male superiors.
Follow Ida’s journey while learning about a wider ‘Sisterhood’ of under-sung and little-known women - a great collection of scientists, astronomers, religious leaders, inventors…ad infinitum!
