My place in our kitchen
If there should be a smooth side
to a sponge, I’m not a sponge.
I’m so stuck in the cycle
of soaked and squeezed,
that I feel too coarse to know,
if I am wet or dry.
Maybe, I am a sponge,
for how I’m wrung out
by your anecdote,
then dropped.
Now wet, so wet,
since I have no place with suds inside your sink.
Resting on a plate smudged with frosting,
friends with metal straws for dim mornings,
when you wake up beside thighs,
craving smiles and flights to Spain.
I could be a cloth, that’s not a cloth,
because I can’t dry you,
not when touching pulsing skin.
Still, I belong draped in your kitchen.
rough-tired and rushed,
but not near you.
Wearing your wine stain with pride,
at being used for no use.
Biography: Jo Farrant is an emerging poet currently studying Art and Creative Writing at the University of Reading. She has been interested in writing and creating for several years and explores several themes in her work including the experience of modern life as a mixed race, queer person living in the UK as well as reflections on human identity as a whole.