Marina Scott is a writer who grew up in Cornwall by the sea. They are currently based in South East London where they work remotely for a literary festival and volunteer for the Feminist Library. With work concerned with gender(ing), ecofeminism, and capitalism, they hold a degree in English Literature from the University of Cambridge and have published work with Sticky Fingers Publishing, SPAM Zine, Polyester Zine, Antithesis Journal and Lucy Writers Platform. They can be found @marina_scott and via Twitter @marinaasinsea or contacted via marina.georgia.scott@gmail.com.
_____
Circles
it’s like being in a crowded room
and watching someone you love
sing their insides up from the chest
into the act of fucking their ex
who was also a musician
and everyone claps
like they’ve discovered a new kind of marketing
which sells you rain for your wedding day
and bottles the tears up as memento mori
for your grandchildren’s grandchildren
who are all dead conditionals anyway
it’s like handing your little sister a stick
so she can beat the aesthetic algorithm
but looking down
and it’s just your mother’s arm
holding a spare tape measure
which is actually a snake’s tongue
disembodied and hissing ssshhiiiit
as it wraps around both your wrists
and twists into a gordian knot
it’s like finishing a painting
after years of final touches
except the painting is a cult
of everyone you’ve even slightly loved
and they want to pillage the town of you
with pitchforks to picket your teeth
until one by one they fall
and you’re a toothless
being in a crowded room
and watching someone you love
_____
Out of the Dream House
after Carmen Maria Machado
I saw a woman who looked like you on
the bus &, for a moment, felt how things
were, back then, before distance sat its
leaden anchor between us. the old, plain
rhythms of our days, turning sound over
in our mouths as if for the first time, our
hearts child-like, wide open, feeling newfound
intonations, echoing each other
this world into sense. I walk along these
streets, breathe in the architecture of us
& soundlessly scream for a way to reach
you. you are in the dream house, never quite
awake. your poor sick heart, your poor sick heart
greets the chloroform unknowingly &
cleaves, cleaves in two again and again and —
if I could write a long prescription
a song
send you an omen
a mirror in a field
birdsong in perpetual dawn —
you’re hurting and I am not an ocean
my lips are blue and I’m drying up
_____
THE AFTERTIME
An extract from ‘GALATEA’
- after industry
a rush of
steel and smog, iron
clang as ice on
teeth and the world split
open by man.
the phyla of this earth
distorted / plastic particles
dense in blood / hot carbon cloying
alveoli. I could have hidden but
they would have found me
eventually
- after assimilation
in accordance with the grain
I learn strange habits
brushing the inside of my mouth
with a plastic stick / twice a day /
until / via erosion / the material
wanes / I encase it in another plastic / thin
black bag
taken / deposited
finally resting on a fluctuating isle of trash /
satanic pit of discarded brands.
if I don’t partake in this ritual
mental health issues might be assumed