Conrad Rayner
Shuttle buses drove in circles around a desert, and their engines squealed as if birds were dying inside them. The dunes moved sideways, creaking silently. I heard the sound in my head and started to giggle. I waited for it to stop, for the sun to stop, and for it to get colder, gradually so, and darker. Gaps between things are infinitely divisible, so it could get colder forever, darker forever. Just when you thought the light was lost, you could lose it again. The buses continued in their circles, and I counted them. There were two. Knowing there were two blew cold air into my lungs, I felt I should choose between them. I was seven the first time I thought I was a girl. For the next ten years I thought I was a boy, or I felt I should choose between them. The buses continued in their circles and I abandoned my counting. Some things never touch, meaning anything that gets darker forever always has a little light left. So I drank a little water. I ate a little chocolate and resumed my counting. I drew my face in the sand, and watched the sand pile into my face.
Conrad Rayner is a poet and boat-dweller from London. Recent works feature in the Seaford Review, the Resonance Poetry Anthology 2026, and elsewhere. They have hosted workshops with a range of collaborators, were longlisted for the Propel Cambridge Poetry Prize, and are an upcoming writer-in-residence at Shakespeare and Company, Paris.
andotherpoems.com 