Little Icarus | Teen Ink

Little Icarus

February 20, 2017
By AnnaFrances SILVER, Belfast, Other
AnnaFrances SILVER, Belfast, Other
5 articles 0 photos 3 comments

Encore.
I stamp out parts of light that are 
alien to me. 
I decide there is nobody, no one who
could love a bent and 
bawling redcoat without 
the means for war.

It’s the same. Light spiral downwards 
I catch in my hand, the intricate workings 
of a little girl’s brain.
Don’t come again. 
She’s not coming out to play.

It grapples my insides, a hideous thing without 
arms or legs but a mouth. 
Pathetic thing, it tries to leave a mark. 
It’s wounds pump like a poison, but there is no mark, 
I make sure to of that.

Pretty Parasite, 
attaches itself to my ribs, porcupine velcro;
spine in a riot,  don’t want it—
up in arms, limbs like jellyfish 
push out to stretch— touching nothing.


There is no light here, only a deep echo,
the darkness of Parousia, feverish
chest. My hair is cut to my shoulders
my eyes are numb green things, everything else is normal
I can pat ropy parts of my muscle onto no one else,
they get stretched and bleached, 
spread thick toffee.

No one told me other things break too. 
fingers, legs, mouth, stomach—
all rolled into one bleak, 
effervescence.

And the typing. It doesn’t hurt 
my ears it hurts everything. 
The click like a cut of skin the 
clack like a slap—
cold meat wrapped around my ears. 
Backgrund noise. Essays— 
words and words, words like 
oxygen making my eyes tired. 

Staircase, upward bound. Alchemy
this is alchemy, the longest walk of 
my life. Here now, the same. I want to 
pull things from my head—
creatures alive and creatures 
dead. 

  I cut bright light, I cut
bulbs in two and open the screaming 
little thing. 
I want nothing at all.
Your breathlessness and mine are the same. 
Falling heavily.

Falling doesn’t frighten me, I do it as often as it comes. 
I take to it 
willingly—

I am nestled 
in thunder, the sound like 
pulling ligaments. The smell like 
pink palms burnt to remove
a perfect layer of skin. 

Help me find a way out; 
this labyrinth, muscle with  
a skeletal cap and a clump 
of hair, too thick to be feathers. 

There is nothing to drink 
from, black pus pouring, 
tap water for the dead. 
Is that what they call it? 
The dance macabre, the 
pull to heaven, 
hellish fit. 

That’s it, 
you can’t escape it  so 
pull then,
thick boughs, 
swollen candelabras- 
you are too late little 
Icarus— 


bright and untouched. 
There is a hole in my dents, 
scratches in my scars. Tomorrow 
will be better, but this hour is 
deep and unending,
flooded trench.

Give me  black noise; white is too
gentle, staccato screaming. Blackness
is real—
no turning back.

I can’t sleep, my dreams 
wriggle like animals
in a boiling pot.

It’s happened again, it’s alien to me, 
the body of a 
dead thing—
moving on fire— tongued
acidity—

The little girl wakes up with nobody.
 



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