THEODORA GALANIS
Adelaide / Student
Working from home
Literature student who is scared of the dark. I usually write about ecological literary theory and I never share my poems with anyone.
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Every thing I write here most definitely happened. I remember it. Nothing added, nothing erased. Memory is certainly a very unreliable Thing.
Downstairs, down three stairs. In the room with the TV and the tin roof.
Was it raining?
Three people sat on the two-seater couch, but I stood staring out the window
At my mum and dad. They were talking, they avoided my eyes.
I saw an old sneaker
a single sneaker, on top of the table.
I remembered that mum told me that shoes on tables in dreams were a terrible, terrible Thing.
Was it inside or out? Was I inside or out
the dream
was all very dark.
I walked through the kitchen, I walked through the dining room.
I was barefoot and my feet stuck to the tiles.
I saw my mum and dad outside
through a different window, of course.
I saw the shoe. It was raining. I think I felt sick.
I ran back to see the three people
now, no people on the couch,
no people outside.
We have a room near the front of our house,
No one does anything in that room. It's empty
expect for a fold out bed with rusted springs
and a wardrobe that doesn’t close properly.
By the window that faces the road
I heard a voice, far away, singing
Get your hot fresh blue peaches. Get your hot fresh blue peaches.
Was that a bell ringing?
Not so far away anymore. Panic.
My bedroom is up the three stairs, to the right.
I tried to move that way. I didn’t move at all.
My legs, stumps
buried into the floorboards,
tree roots grew from my soles into the soil under the house
And I tore away at the web of muddy bloody sinews.
Wake up. No
where to go.
I am screaming in silence.
Coughing, spluttering sap and acid.
No breath in or out. Was it in or out?
I can hear it screaming
Hot
Fresh
Blue
lips.
(19/3/2020)
Downstairs, down three stairs. In the room with the TV and the tin roof.
Was it raining?
Three people sat on the two-seater couch, but I stood staring out the window
At my mum and dad. They were talking, they avoided my eyes.
I saw an old sneaker
a single sneaker, on top of the table.
I remembered that mum told me that shoes on tables in dreams were a terrible, terrible Thing.
Was it inside or out? Was I inside or out
the dream
was all very dark.
I walked through the kitchen, I walked through the dining room.
I was barefoot and my feet stuck to the tiles.
I saw my mum and dad outside
through a different window, of course.
I saw the shoe. It was raining. I think I felt sick.
I ran back to see the three people
now, no people on the couch,
no people outside.
We have a room near the front of our house,
No one does anything in that room. It's empty
expect for a fold out bed with rusted springs
and a wardrobe that doesn’t close properly.
By the window that faces the road
I heard a voice, far away, singing
Get your hot fresh blue peaches. Get your hot fresh blue peaches.
Was that a bell ringing?
Not so far away anymore. Panic.
My bedroom is up the three stairs, to the right.
I tried to move that way. I didn’t move at all.
My legs, stumps
buried into the floorboards,
tree roots grew from my soles into the soil under the house
And I tore away at the web of muddy bloody sinews.
Wake up. No
where to go.
I am screaming in silence.
Coughing, spluttering sap and acid.
No breath in or out. Was it in or out?
I can hear it screaming
Hot
Fresh
Blue
lips.
(19/3/2020)