it’s not the willow pattern plate
behind cold museum glass
it’s not your brother’s birthday cake
white frosted on the pantry shelf
it’s the diaphragm
pulling in smoke from the ruined hall
it’s the hand
clasped round metal five hundred volts hot
it’s the skull’s
connection with the steering wheel
thrown long before we knew where it would stop
Katy Naylor is an office worker, a teacher and a mom of two. She lives on the south coast of England, and makes games and writes poems in the time that falls between the cracks.