We leave bits of our bodies everywhere which means the hoover is always full of skin

She spent the morning pulling his hair out of the plughole

Felted into fibre glass, her hair
Chokes up the hairbrush.

When she is half awake,
She dreams about it falling out
in clumps.
She’d look odd bald; an app on her phone confirmed his hunch.

She is chewing her lip, again.
She worries that strangers will mistake the scab for a cold sore.
like they read into bruises.

He asked her whether she picked or bit her cuticles.
She told him those bits of skin don’t tan anymore.
I guess she’s dug the melanin out.

When she is bored, or waiting,
She teases the hair round her temples,
Idly nurses her thumb,
Slides her nail under the scab.

She’s not sure if it’s an eyelash
or an eyebrow hair;
Either way, she’ll wish.
If her breath can’t tug it loose,
because her finger’s wet,
She’ll save it under her thumbnail
and forget

The murmur of him

a single dark hair curled into the soap.

 

 

Scaffolding

A shell invaded by a hermit crab,

A mite occupying a clam.

You have made your home in me—

Sheltering in the seams of my dress,

Burrowing in the crook of my arm,

Nesting in my hair.

Fat tick hanging in my armpit.

Termite in my window pane.

Bedbug.

You have built yourself onto me like a

Bodged extension. Cowboy builders

Binding us together with wallpaper paste.

You made your house here,

Before you knew

It was barren.

Make sure you draw the curtains

When you come home.

 

This poetry was published in The ISIS‘s TT18 edition. Read the full magazine here.