nation building

there’s a shiny pink
cocktail onion
sticking out of my foot
my poor foot
and how i screamed
when the consultant
placed her steroid jab
into my aching hip
then came these spiderlings
from my pen release
the gold moon my gobstopper
while the chocolate bought for
David’s
birthday
caramel sea salt
has been completely
defeated
with to humiliate it further
a decaf coffee
as poured into the
uncomfortably
right-handed
clitoris cup
Julia gave to me
for summer solstice
though since my head
newly shorn
is emitting sound waves
received from
the streets of Afghanistan
where more and more
singing wrecked women
are gathering
i don’t expect to sleep

Janet Charman

Janet Charman’s 10th collection ’the intimacy bus’ was published in 2025 by OUP. Her creative memoir’28 days’, with illustrations by Elizabeth Anderson, appeared simultaneously from Skinship Press, Tamaki Makaurau, AK.