Lesley Hart Gunn
Trying not to Turn
it isn’t natural
for the human body
to reject the sun.
we are conditioned to
yearn for the outstretched
rays like the handprint
of a god on our unworthy
heads, but the moon
is the only thing left
to worship and it has short
arms yet leaves scars deep
as craters. i ask
when it will be over
when the thirst will become
companionable as limbs
when will the echo of empty
caverns replace my
beating heart?
i eat my shadow
(my shadow eats me)
our parasites entwine
an act of bondage
to slow and silence whirring
processes and shallow breaths,
pain is just the leeching
of light from soft
places, it happens as quiet
as spider steps, a slow
suffocation of all my
glowing parts–
fear mutates body
consumes soul,
i taste what i am
in the back of my throat
where screams get their wings
and fly, notice
how the night plays
on the skin like a water-skipper–
oh, to feel light-dwelling life
in blood-sacked bodies
that shiver and age
to once again be part of
those who weep salty brine,
whose hopes and dreams
are cast on time worn and
worry-infested waters…
i fill my mouth
with what tastes like
liquid sunshine/desire
lips rimmed in Hell’s red sleep–
i remember
and memory makes torment
for vampiric eyes
that gaze on the flame
understand immortality
is nothing but purpose spilled
into the dark, endless
unquenchable abyss
_______________
Lesley Hart Gunn is the winner of the Fall 2022 F(r)iction Poetry Contest and has upcoming or previous publications in Strange Horizons, Asimov’s Science Fiction, PseudoPod, Carve Magazine, Flash Fiction Magazine, and Phantom Drift Journal. She is originally from the lakes and lighthouses of Atlantic Canada but currently lives in the snow-capped mountains of the American West with her partner and three children.
Author’s Backstory: The genesis of this poem: I live in the American West where the desert sun and drought are common, but I am originally from eastern Canada and used to cool rain and humidity, so I often feel like my body is rejecting the intense sun and searching for shadows. This is what started me thinking about how it would feel to lose all tolerance for sunlight and to replace it with darkness.
Editor’s Notes and/or Image Credit: As input to the Microsoft Designer: “abstract: no sunlight, she has red eyes and can only survive in dark abyss,” the output is a bit dark but not horrific.
