By Aoife Mannix 

I let the orange blossoms sink in 

behind my eyelids.  I have been  

that ghost nobody believes in. 

I have haunted the cheap afternoons. 

I have worn a mask in Venice  

where every corner hides your own funeral.  

I have been drowned for witchcraft,  

held under long enough to prove  

I should be hung.   

My grandfather tried to murder my mother. 

It’s taken half a century to grasp what it means 

to be a child running for help from the neighbours 

because your baby sister is being suffocated. 

I have flown on the wings of ravens, 

landed soft as sugar in the snow. 

I have midnight under my fingernails.   

Some do it with a sword, some do it with a kiss.   

The graves hold unmarked babies.  The shame  

of willow trees weeping into lost names.   

If you eat enough thorns  

you too will speak of blood sucking secrets, 

rapes nobody cares to mention. 

We sip our past heartbreaks, 

the ones who didn’t love us 

and the ones who did. How it is possible 

to spend years under cover and not even realise  

you were the one in disguise all along. 

The horizon bleeds white poppies.  

Cover your skeletons with your sleeve.  

I have no way to grieve the night of the dead,  

but I say to you, hold my hand,  

let’s dance in the morning 

with the taste of smoke in our mouths.