American Literary Magazine
First Supper Vishwa Bhatt Content Warning: eating disorders
We are the type of family To feed our delicacies to the crows Watching the things we aspire for Be pecked at & hollowed out The remnants of these easy pickings Still rotting long after we turn our heads (when they asked if we had any last words this is why we said no) Our dreams sit untouched on the dining table So we grind them to seeds Then discard them in the birdfeeder Of our neighbor’s backyard Convinced the feeling that knots our intestines Is disgust (after all, we know what comes of craving) We swathe ourselves in empty stomachs And wipe away the saliva that does not froth at our lips When blood bursts from our left nostrils Our first instinct is to lick that clean too Obedience is a meal we could swallow our whole lives As long as we sick ourselves when no one sees We are a family who starves a good reputation Then pretends we aren’t gorging on crumbs
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