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Rachel O'Sullivan
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the poet
Rachel O'Sullivan is a 24-year-old queer writer based in Dublin, Ireland. Their work has featured in Full House Literary, The Winged Moon, Fatal Flaw and elsewhere. You'll find them lingering along the borders between strange objects, inexplicable feelings, circling thoughts and untraceable words.
the poems
Stood & standing.
I overstay my welcome, push the clock-out. Rent meant to be 40% of weekly cheque
that would be a dream. Dyson blew a fuse.
Air quality checks at opening & close. 6:12pm, carbon monoxide levels
8ppi below toxic.
A long year.
A fresh start.
A new job.
But, the bathroom door needs your body weight to
click the lock. They worry & worry. Is your accommodation
safe Rachel?
There’s something in these lungs & it’s not air.
My dreams from the last week:
The city flooded.
Every country on fire.
My father robbed the shop.
Late for work.
Twice at peace, girlfriend wrapped around me.
Punching & punching & punching.
My girl drowning & drowning & drowning.
Reach Phibsborough & video call the ones
abroad. Box room smells of period blood
& sour tears. Citrus oils & 1,000 perfumes. Watch
them
slip.
I count them on my hands, the ones who
leave & won’t come back. 4, 5, 6.
My summers will be border hopping, but
I will be the last one standing on this sinking ship.
I will not leave.
Every day I promise this.
The country gets smaller.
I get hungrier.
The rooms get tighter.
I am awake
(an affirmation).
the middle of the world –
nicholas britell
–my job to drive the car, clumsy backseat transitions without a breath, downshift gear, first
exit here, remember the shadowy corner,
there’s dew on the trees this morning, daddy, don’t crash the car,
remember , the dog is in the boot asleep with
his paws in a heap his head on top holding in the still,
let the air in, hear doggy’s sweet dreams, twitching feet, soft yips,
don’t crash the car daddy, little sister
is leaning on the window,
she wants you to let the windows down, her stomach is sore,
she wants to go home but she’ll be fine
when we get there,
she likes the beach, she wants to get there
she just doesn’t want you to
crash the car daddy,
what would we tell,
I know, the suspension on this car is shit and
when you drive you sway like you don’t know what you’re dancing with
but it’s only 10 on a Sunday and if you love us
there’s no room for error when you’re driving
this fast daddy and people come flying out
from that drive, you’ve seen
them, horses come down this
road the riding school has
kiddie lessons at this time
we always see
them it’s
harvest season
too they’re all coming for the markets and ice cream just like us they’re all like us
what’s out the window there’s nothing to see out there we’re in here daddy the road is
slippery in the shadows and
there’s dew on the `
trees and
little do
we
know
what’s
around
the
almost domestic
Dentist returns molar to palm
alive and dripping crack right up the root
infection clumped, he says I have never been still
even in sleep have only learned rest as an adult,
by holding myself so tightly cracked
the bones look at it
knowing well my incisors and
canines visible with Swarovski crystals never
get around to the back parts of myself meant to be
half buried in the soil and rock of gums and jaw
now in my hand and dead, flat broad
tooth for a herbivore
like me
shrunken memory
of the horse tooth spanned palm
seven years ago my little pony had an infected molar
witness to bodily extraction on the other end of the rope
held it slack, the pony he stayed more still when he
knew he could run move smoothed the other
hand in small circles on his shoulder
small touch that language
I writhed more
for my dentist his knees locked
dozing, veterinarian pried out the massive roots
clump of infection hanging off nerve the spinning
draw to the hidden life inside the mouth cosmic
black hole of exposed bones all
the ways I could still learn to
worship him.
I wanted to be a vet
to mend things liked the pull of stitches
soak of poultice wrangle of ticks letting in birth
staving off death absorbed with everything in the middle –
eighteen years watching bones set straight again the slow crawl
of patchworking skin starting over; immediate expanse of graveyard
shifts, mistranslation of a life where I am indistinguishable
from caged creatures my time on earth a vessel to
hold theirs to be a complete
sun for them to
live under.
Allow them to
lead me through life a child
learning balance from paw prints in settling dirt sounding
out echoes of their hooves my service and sermon tending those
that facilitated rewilding, unmastery of self, the dogs the ponies
the rabbit the guinea pig the echoes and shadows of foxes
badgers deer birds almost domesticated myself
for them, for the witchcraft that might have
propped them up alongside
my long, winding
trail around this
soil and
rock.
Publishing credits
All poems: exclusive first publication by iamb