Amelia Dubin Shame It’s hot to touch It burns at the tips of your fingers Blackening them like peat Dust as murky as that pond at the end of your garden Do you remember? Wading through it Searching You lost something down there Down in the depths Was it your Mother’s? It’s surrounded by dust Brown and black and green and bruised The inside of your thighs after that day in the woods After he left you there A shell beneath the oak tree After that late evening he opened the door After he left you there Alone and shaking on the bare mattress It’s covered in mud and it’s caked in dust And you’re terrified of it Of its blistering darkness Its silence is filling your head with the words you never want to hear You can’t drown them out The silence is too loud The silence is screaming now Screaming in your head like your crying mother Sat at the kitchen table Crying
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