Ship’s Desk
I could have been flung overboard with smoke floats,
not detained at port without explanation.
I imagine the bottom of the ocean,
the torment of tentacles tugging on my nestled drawers
while plankton swish through keyholes.
On solid ground, there’s not the comforting creak of the ship’s bowels
but they found me a relative’s house
that likes to stretch its oak beams and wooden floors.
I’m not your great granddad’s anymore.
I’m for phonebooks, the bank folder, the hole punch.
I smell of absent keys and warm money
not of salt and sweat and changeable weather like you’d expect.
(from The Withering Room, Green Bottle Press)
Sarah Sibley was born in 1985 and grew up in rural Suffolk. She studied Creative Writing at Wolverhampton and Lancaster. Her work has been published in Agenda, Iota, Orbis, Ink, Sweat & Tears, The Delinquent and Obsessed with Pipework. Her first pamphlet The Withering Room is published by Green Bottle Press. Twitter @sibley_sarah
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