Slagheap Slag
By Frances Gillard
I am hag
Slap dash
Sag.
Slagheap slag
Mother. Slapper. Saggy skinned lover,
Unloved.
Heart a knotted length of rope, voice of pouring gravel and a touch that reminds you of tarmac on a hot day
supermarket ham skin sweating under fluorescent light
Don’t look at me.
Stop.
God forbid I leave this house without a bit of slap.
This stomach-turning tummy, belly
bulge
a bit Big
Protruding
Uncomfortable
God I’m
Silly
In this bag of skin
Do I
Am I
Don’t suit leaving the house like I used to, may as well stay inside
the way
This
This
This gave everything to you, every inch of this body
Tiny I was! brittle fish-bone thing
Don’t look at me.
I mean it
I bet the boys love you
I bet they do
So handsome
Of course they do look at her! she’s the spit of you when you
were that age
they couldn’t keep their hands off me
couldn’t help but touch me wanted to hold me with a firm grip wanted to
want me
grabbing for that smiling little girl,
stay that little, girl,
before the rot sets in.
Do they want you like that?
Want for nothing else but the feel of that life giving in all soft and flesh but not too much, of course
just enough to put on the tongue
to fit in one palm
bird-body
easy to swallow
the size of a nut or the stone of a peach
or a pomegranate seed
and just as sweet, just as sweet
just as sweet as that
not a hag like me.