

A.M. Reid
A.M. Reid is a 23-year-old freelance content writer based in the UK.
Half Empty
A note from the writer: "this poem explores being entrapped in trauma, and although constantly trying to push free and ‘move on', never being able to truly escape."
If I was a crab, I could moult away my skin when it turns too tight,
grow a new one, more spacious.
You’ll be okay you’re strong you’ll move on
I try to swallow them but they’re stuck, there, in the back of my throat,
so I regurgitate them all back up with I’m okay – strong – I’ll move on
like a mother bird feeding her worried chicks.
This seems to satisfy them.
They stop saying the words they think they need to say.But I’m left starved; stomach half empty.
Breathe.
If I was a crab, and not a mother bird, I could scuttle, at least sideways, at least something,
I could scuttle into the waves and vanish, let the sea drift me from scalding sands, rinse it all awayand I think, I think then I would be okay.
At least, until the tide pulls me back to shore.Suggested Articles
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