Shortlist Saturdays: Ripple by Leen Raats

Ripple

My room is calmness. Here, in the haze of morning

contours take shape, in this gray year that slowly

lets go. My short fingers caress the frayed hems

of worn-out days.

The hallway, an in-between world that connects

and cuts off. Door to the outside bustles like a knife

at my throat. I am a virus that roams across

windswept squares without corners.

Feverishly, I chase myself over the thresholds of houses

where pain has no designated place, get lost in junk drawers

between cables and keys that don't fit anything.

Locks like open wounds.

Sometimes my tongue can’t find its way to words.

Back outside, I expand. Open up like the beaches

I fear. Water that comes and never really

goes. Waves I can dance with when the rhythm

finds my tired legs.

Time leaves shadows on open seas.

Leen Raats lives in Belgium. She is a freelance copywriter. Her work got published in lit mags such as 34 Orchard, Pleiades, Descant, Crannóg, Rathalla Review, and DarkWinter Lit. Leen is obsessed with rock music, finding inspiration in even the heaviest of riffs and the loudest of screams. Find out more at leenwrites.com or on Instagram: @leen.raats