Portrait

Your lips hang off your teeth

like skin on uncooked chicken,

yellowed and puckered.

Head hanging loosely on your skinny neck,

(as if you were trying,

in a half-assed sort of way,

to peer underneath the carpet),

you suck in a wet breath,

shoulders sagging as it leaks back out.

The double-glazing on your puffy eyes

has a pinkish tone,

etched with road-map reds.

Stuck to the side of your stubbled left cheek,

a dark strand of greasy hair flickers dully

with each flash of the silent TV.

-Nicola Barber