SASHA MOSTAFA

Third Prize - 2024 Tower Poetry Competition, 'Mirror'

 

Photographic Memory

We’re important - so

he reflects. Dates,

coffee orders – he spells out

each sentence of

each undertaking, 

each serrated need. Each limb

flung back. A morning glance –

I stare ahead

at my real eyes,

his echo.

I tell him to forget

the white nights, the Moon

shivering in her silky fog,

vernix caseosa for our sharp,

silent painting.

Forget the Sun everywhere,

peeling away from the inside

of my mouth. Forget

what we won at,

forget what crimped into soggy

remembrance, like Monday rain,

touch we threw

to the corner. Forget

retreat and emergence,

like wet seals searching

for the snugness of air.

Forget my skin

forgetting. Suiting otherness,

his brand-new matter. Ghosts here,

and here, and here.

I tell him to root 

on this side of the glass.

Love as stems

from touch of hands,

not the formulae 

of lines upon them.

To forget our shapes;

to enjoy only

our colourful wants,

tengujo calendars,

tonight ringing, flicking

like a warm sparrow.