Mouth Wide Shut
Published in
1 min readMay 14, 2021
The tongue is in the teeth of some
whiter than a lampshade in heat
lit by the language of others
a palate to place
food on, litmus test
for the health of the lying
How many are now
one-eyed, don’t need
the tongue to hold a fork
just a policeman’s mind to ward off
the inconvenient glare -
there is no home here
Selfhood beware — the gutters are
filled with failed ideas
stillbirths in this age of unreason
trapped in the kernel of the throat,
a knot, a stone, finally
this dead zone
Most let the clouds pass by while
pregnant words cause bacteria
and the swell of defeat gathers
in the neck
aided by the dumbest ear
We are perhaps finished -
I will go inside
look for my own speck
keep my mouth wide open
COPYRIGHT Simon Heathcote
© Simon Heathcote 2021
