Boy

Here is a boy.
His seams are unravelling.
He is held together with duct tape.

He lives in a music box.
He lives in a fireplace.
He lives a long time ago.

Here is a paper butterfly heart.
Here are the wrong coloured stitches.
Here are spaces for eyes.

His hair is words on a page.
His voice is made out of string.
His throat like a mermaid.

He came from the sea.
He doesn’t know where he came from.
He created himself with a needle.

Here is a boy made of smoke.
Here is the fire.
Here is the fire.

***

Rachel Plummer is a recipient of the Scottish Book Trust New Writer Awards 2016 and a Troubadour prizewinner 2014. She has been widely published including in Mslexia, The Stinging Fly, 154 Anthology of Sonnets, the Poetry on the Move scheme and in her co-authored pamphlet, Char (Hidden Door Press, 2016). Her current project is a book of LGBT themed poems based on Scottish mythologies for LGBT Youth Scotland and Creative Scotland.

Read ‘Selkie’ also by Rachel here.

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