Caitlin Thomson
long distance
you answer
and my heart explodes into a thousand
tiny blue pixels
the deepest tones of the ocean
we could frame it, for people to stare at
forget that picasso piece of shit and his blue period
baby will you touch
me, dig into my skin with your
nail beds a half marshmallow moon
and i would lie with u, a blanket of new skin to shelter us under a waxing, not waning
god i haven’t waxed in months
like unruly rows of pumpkin flowers
hair starfishes out beneath my
knickers and sometimes pokes through fabric, sharp and enthusiastic
some nights i dream only of your mouth on my nipple
and some dark place where i can’t quite see your face
but feel your tongue inside me
then i wake without insides and hiding places
only a paper body, two dimensional
which i fold up / when u don’t call
Wedding with an ex
She’s in white and your hand on my wrist feels like a ring
those eyes a promise undressing me slowly and I can’t
stop what’s coming in the stupid night up on the
hill star-watching with sistine chapel fingers and half-
moon eyes secrets in our hair bitter cream kisses open-
lipped lies watch me through eye creases i worship,
sacred map lines burned in my mind every part of me is spilling with
sadness stumbling on broken glass underfoot puncture
marks on a white cloth, jewelled tears whispers in my ear
of don’t—you know I’d still die for this love cross legged
on a clovered field denial in my dreams i hear you cry
down the phone my ear slick with grief.
growing pains
I cut my fringe with
the kitchen scissors
the day before my birthday.
Oh to be sixteen and hunt the boys
with deep voices and hair in their eyes,
to pass rollies around like sweets
and run for the last bus every Friday
a seven minute sprint from the pub
on drunken bambi legs,
to have my heart between my teeth
as arctic monkeys spins through the air,
vodka and cranberry in
plastic cups
boys looping their fingers
through my fishnet tights
in the smoking area out back,
to be flirting in a box room
with sweat and strangers and music
escaping from the cracks
of little buildings
wrists stamped and ready
for deliverance in
the night’s envelope
to sleep that first night in his flat
a cut out Shearer
ever-benevolent behind the sofa
tea bitter and black
as he cups my belly
and Alex hums and we were both stuck
on the puzzle…
I watch the sunrise through
the sky light, scared
to climb onto the roof.
Caitlin Mae Thomson is a writer from northern England. Her poetry has appeared in The Bitchin’ Kitsch, Bullshit Lit, Dreich, Trouvaille Review, etc. She holds a first class Gender Studies M.Phil from Trinity College Dublin, Ireland and an English B.A. from the University of Bristol, UK.