“Facial Reconstruction” by Síle Englert
Poetry Pause is the League of Canadian Poets’ daily poetry dispatch. Read “Facial Reconstruction” by Síle Englert.
Facial Reconstruction
By Síle Englert
i. Left eye
This is not a window— it’s a curtain. You might think this is how the light gets in, that even the most determined of neurons can’t glow in this dark. Something inside must be illuminated. More like a black hole, where light bends and is absorbed. The rays reflect. The cornea refracts, twisting white and everything is upside down. Which explains a lot. It used to be blue but now it’s grey.
ii. Right eye
It used to be grey but now it’s blue. It’s a trap, where gauze is draped to veil the view. Keep quiet. This is no way to peer inside a body. Don’t look. There is more than meets and the soul inside is nocturnal, startled-pale in the glare. Hold back, refrain. This is the refrain: not a window, not a door. No exit. Not an accessible venue. Inside, there is some other dimension and no way back.
iii. Nose
There is no way back because it came from a place no maps will speak to. We called it before. And then it was broken. This grandfathering echo from some other jagged slice of rock, traveling by ship with its own particular baggage. In colourless photographs, it blurs over a woman’s face, interrupting. It vibrates with an unremembered elsewhere.
iv. Mouth
Over time, a molten thing unremembers its shape and becomes a weapon. More like a scalpel than a sword. A slit when it’s smiling, a wound otherwise. All cutting things come from this place. Words. A song. Their absence. The memory loss of lips when they forget how to turn up at corners, only spreading wide. Wider. Speak always yes and everything fits inside.
v. Hair
Everything fits, if you say it’s glitter. The frame for this composite painting. If the heft of these years must be carried, at least it can sparkle. My precious mettle spun from straw; count one for each joy, two for each pain and let them be. Let them all be.
Copyright © Síle Englert
Previously published in the way out is the way in (LCP Chapbook Series, 2021)
Síle Englert is a queer, Autistic writer and multi-disciplinary artist. She is the author of The Lost Time Accidents (icehouse press 2021) and two chapbooks: The Phobic’s Handbook (Anstruther Press, 2020) and Threadbare (Baseline Press, 2019). Síle’s writing has placed second in CV2’s 2-Day Poem Contest and Freefall Magazine’s Fiction Contest, and was shortlisted for Arc Poetry Magazine’s Poem of the Year in 2020. Her writing has also appeared in publications including: The Fiddlehead, Room, Canthius, The Dalhousie Review, and Carousel.
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