ella B. winters

Maybe these things never happened

On a good day, you laugh 
at my stupid jokes 
and pin me to the wall
with your lips. We break 
some eggs and make 
omelettes, grind 
fresh coffee, spill
milk into our cups. 

The bad days last long 
into the dark. Your black
vinyl eyes spin 
endlessly, skip over
skip over scratched 
surface, then     skip,
then start again. 
I try to keep up. 
You tell me to stop 
humming off-key. 
You say I'm a broken 
boombox. You try to fix 
my static with a good 
thump to the side. 

Once, you hallucinated me
as a snake, slithering softly
over a chest of drawers, 
fire tongue forking 
towards your shivering
skin, bed morphing
into life raft, ready
to carry you off,
flare guns blazing, 
across the ash-clogged river
of the carpet. 
You don't remember that, 
of course.

Ella B. Winters (she/they) is a social worker, writer, and double immigrant, living on the South-East coast of England with her partner and a sausage dog. Her work often explores themes of identity and locating yourself in the world. She is currently working on her PhD in Health Science.