Our breathing sounds like a blanket
- Our breathing sounds like a blanket
Hot winds bring trouble.but the tunnels are cool,algae water runningankle-deep,slippery,down the middle.
If a storm catches us herewe'll drown.
But the sky issharp autumn blue.The tunnel opening atiny circle of white.
They won't find us here,we are far from the light.
Beyond where teenagersscrawl names andcrude suggestionsacross the walls.
We'll stay here,in this between place.
A tunnel vision view.
Where our words echoour words echoand our laughtersounds frightening.
You speak of musesand demons,poetry and visions,children in pain. [End Page 423]
Things you can only sayin the dark.Where our facesare smudgesand our breathingsounds like a blanket.
The water runs sluggish here,where the tunnel turnsfurther into the earthand the darkness becomesabsolute.Spots of silver and gold flickerlike peacock featherdifficult to tellif the eyesare open or closed.
We are in the bellyof the serpent.You say.
Can you smell it?That scent of decay,the stagnation of thought.
The death of tomorrow.
I begin to worry aboutyour sanity,my sanity,that tiny circle of lightin the distance,extinguished. [End Page 424]
A. G. Pettet is a poet, short-fiction writer, academic, literary critic, publisher, and editor. His poems and other writings have been published in Australia, the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, New Zealand, and India, including in Oxford Poetry, Australian Poetry Anthology, Island Magazine, Going Down Swinging, World Literature Today, Dazed and Confused Magazine (International) Broadsheet, and the Cortland Review. He has performed, chaired panels, and been a panel member at various festivals, including the Brisbane Writers Festival, Queensland Poetry Festival, and the National Young Writers Festival. This is his first appearance in Antipodes.
