lacuna

so it was you,
unspooling the sinew from my muscle:
eleven times the burial. seven kinds
of birthing.
story about skinny or
orchard bearing not enough bones. how much
can this skin hold
before it shrivels? story for
a bleeding girl. a valley that hides
or a boy who’s splitting his stomach
two-fold. story about
ivory lips and rib-less cages. if not
anatomy then
scalpels or thunder spooned
from another lifetime. if not
a story about hunger then a feast
of dead birds so that the living
may crawl out of their husks and bay
until the trough is brimming with grain.
story as urban myth as tale
of starvation or severance to
a god complex or a hipbone extracted.
it is dark and this is a story
about children with beasts in their throats,
glass fists without fingers. a thousand
foot soldiers folding back
the moon until
only children are left and their bodies
shine lightless.

By Stephanie Chang

Biography:

Stephanie Chang is fifteen years old and a high school student from Vancouver, BC. Her work has appeared in Verdancies, Horn & Ivory, The Occulum, and more. She currently serves as a blog contributor for Minute Magazine.