by Ian McLachlan
Shaking palms snap
buzzing machine heart
thwack of wheels
shouts
under red skies;
in hiding.
Are they born
mad? We say
they are born mad.
They bare their
white teeth.
Bang.
Staked out
on log stretchers
each a bag of meat
a black purse
of meat my kin.
The plain torched.
Their war
on the world.
They show me off
a prisoner of war
rap the glass
to get me
looking
shuffling forward
into the light.
Closer. Click
click, click
is their sound.
Look my hands
are like theirs.
I catch the tang
of animal on them
how ignorance
also cages.
Ian McLachlan’s writing has been published in a number of magazines including The Rialto, Magma, Aesthetica and Under The Radar. He has a cat named Calcifer who likes to put mice in his trainers, and tweets @ianjmclachlan.
