• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to content

New Writing

  • Subjects
  • Latest
Poetry

Nullipara

Emma Mackilligin

There are many things Dr. M didn’t tell me.
Side effects including (but not limited to):

Nausea brought on by
toothpaste/garlic/cigarettes/conversation

An inclination to fall in love
with portraits of women in art galleries

Occasional difficulty breathing
eased only by Petula Clark

Anxiety around the possibility
that my bed could be unisex

A skin-and-boniness
laughably unsuited to my ‘situation’

And hourly repetitions of
I’m fine I’m fine I’m fine.

 

There are some things Dr. M knows about me.
Information including (but not limited to):

The fact that Saturn
has had too strong an influence on me

My belief that lipstick and thin cigarettes
are the epitome of female elegance

The anxiety inspired in me
by the very young

The ambivalence
with which I regard the Rubenesque

Some of my fears
including those relevant to my situation

And infrequent repetitions of
I’m fine I’m fine I’m fine.

 

—
(First published in Lighthouse Issue 9, Gatehouse Press)

Share this post:

Reader Interactions

contactsubmissionsabout
design and development: Blackman Rossouw