Swallow

by India Southgate

“…Oh God, it was extremity in every sense,

It began with underground filth,

At clubs in subcultures, I don’t know,

She must have felt that she needed

Shock value for respect, which I didn’t agree with,

Or maybe I was just too cowardly to do that,

But she kept taking all these requests,

And accumulated hundreds of things,

Highlighted in an emaciated body,

And she would contort,

To show it off… boy, did she draw in crowds.

I remember there was, A pearl necklace,

That went in whole, many glass objects,

That I didn’t like, and a credit card,

That we couldn’t get back,

But I think the worst one,

Was when we were at The Bird Cage,

A new club with no promotion,

They wanted a reputation, Of Edge,

Dare, Repulsion, it was just publicity really,

So, they asked her for a special request.

It was grotesque, it writhed and beat

Its bloody wings. She was pregnant with

a new kind of sin, I don’t think God had anticipated,

Because really? Who thinks to do that?

You could see its claws tunnelling through,

Grasping at nothing. She said she felt sick,

But when she opened her mouth

It sung…And that’s all they wanted,

A stunt.

All she could do after was regurgitate it…

Yeah, they never gave her the money for that one…

But it did hit the papers.” 

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India Southgate, currently an English Literature student at University in England, recently reignited her passion for writing poetry from when she would write songs in her adolescent years. She has found herself attempting to archive her observation of the world through poetry.