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.