DRUGS Poem: limbo (an interlude), by Megan Slater

on July 2022

the hair yellowed, overbleached
the numbing feeling in your teeth,
the biting bruised, the blood beading
the stomach with that sinking feeling

ruminating, retrospectively,
Plastic Beach by Gorillaz on CD
you said i told you so,
this is your innate inability to say no

(i think i could’ve predicted it,
i think my gut had pictured it)

the sub-let studio, semi-illegally so,
the branches bursting through the window
the spray paint fumes, the fibre-glass residue
the mattress on the floor, and you

you and Jesus Christ on a lighter,
and the faux-intimacy of 2CB,
her hair yellowed, over-bleached
her slender limbs like plasticine,
and the things you said, but didn’t mean