Niamh Harra

Novices

instant removal of benzo buttered toast & chocolate covered raisins breakfast is dim crumbs of puff pastry memories stuck to a jam’s knife edge soggy chequered tea towels sanitising canteen tables oh gluttony littered plastic straws now littered plastic cups a refusal of trust in lungs feelings chart scratched like potter’s pink lady onto our knuckles flicks of tabasco on the splashback tabasco was all I ate in rehab seriously the people here are like novice violinists beautiful but screeching for something untouched

Nasal matter

mum feeds us warm formula milk packed under boogie boards in the boot enniscrone sand dunes only an attitude away mid-west radio declares an optimistic forecast & I guzzle sunday milk like I am about to be buried in sand my sister rubs her toes below my seat as I sniff & sneeze policing every nasal matter in hay fever or narcotic season I try to hold it in the tickle on the edge of my nose like a piece of anti-clockwork in a sci-fi movie I wind down the window purging formula onto tractors on the n17

For the sake of sertraline

& scrabble the blue moon is out like my sister sipping calpol as broken armed child tcp toothless & grieving her scooter we are still sucking on serotonin hoping scrabble won ’t tear us apart deficiencies waning our souls like grated lemon zest often regarded as scraps

Haystacks

in a refurbished barn haystacks can’t soak up the sound of grief hacking up crotchets & quavers in an attempt to drown out the smell of urine

three full bin liners & a vomit ridden rug sit outside awaiting

their not-so-imminent death oh how chanting sláinte! has wired me again like a lunatic pigeon country cables knotted around my ears oozing remorse for the sermon I gave only one of the dead hamsters

I spit out the corkscrew before the rodents start singing