Sublimate Me
into wooded copse
where the shadows
fidget on the ground
like nervous fingers
in a buttonhole
I’ll let the moss grow
over beady bird eyes
and scrape lichen from bark
with a long fingernail
until it becomes
a part of me
let the paper white bark peel
in strips
from my failing flesh
coffee-stained tree rings
cigarette ash tapped
understorey
bleeding rot-hole cavities
and when all the nerves are shredded
into shot-holed leaves
I’ll sink my broken bones
into the soft dark matter of you
it’s hard to hear
from there of course
but I know
that when the ground elder creeps
you will stop and listen
Daniel Cartwright-Chaouki is a writer and gardener from Birmingham, England. His writing is informed by a range of themes and ideas. In particular, he focuses on the intersection between people, plants and landscape. His work has previously been published in Brand Magazine, Pulp Poets Press, Bodies on Bodies Magazine, Fixator Press, Password, The Lake, The Cannon’s Mouth and 100subtexts magazine.