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Poetry

Swallow Twice

Inua Ellams

This poem is part of the SPOONFEED takeover of New Writing, curated by Kat Payne Ware and Sean Wai Keung. You can read the issue in full at spoonfeedmag.com/spoonfeed-x-new-writing

 

Given the smallest prompt / Father will describe

how I skulked just beyond the lamplight’s reach

 

watching the ring of men / ripe with beer and laughter

push thick fingers into the mountain of spiced meat

 

roasted with onions / ginger and chillies like an altar

I fought to worship at / swiping through their arms

 

at the chunks / a mouse attempting to feast

with kings / Frustrated / Father stopped their speech

 

so I could reach in / greedily choose the choicest piece

ignore his warnings and tear at the muscle / strain

 

against the flesh till its elasticity slipped my fingers

and the chunk / chillies and all slapped into my eyes.

 

Father thumped my back as I coughed on the pepper

/ swallow twice / he urged / dropping the wailing mess

 

of me on Mother’s knees / What Father didn’t know

is I imagined the key to their impenetrable talk

 

lay in the cubed meat and I longed to be like them

 

In the circle of friends I have / most of our conversations

revolve around music / the heft and sway of the changing

 

world / the rapid rate of our redundance / how best

to pretend we know it all and when beer loosens

 

what inhibitions are left after shredding meat

with bare fingers / laughter cloaks our weaknesses:

 

our inability to provide for those we love / who love us

we who still know nothing of what our lovers want

 

how frightening it is to have nephews growing up

who want to be like us / who want to be like men

 

 

 

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