mandisa apena

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i dream of my ancestors and they appear in the clammiest sunlight

everything smells
      slowly here
        swollen men
         sea-slope
        slurred bottles
           in hand
              saline smiles
                like heat
                  rise again 
               to street
           pass bodies
        that seem
 to ripple
     in slo-mo
   over tarmac
       like heat
          rise again
        through cloud
    mountain fern’s
sweaty song
   rock face
         grazing ear
      strange place
         this; here
       reminds you
    you’re only
         dust

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MANDISA APENA is a cancer sun from south london. they are an interdisciplinary artist interested in herbalism, dreams and nature worship. they have a self published poetry book called and twice as bitter (2016), and have been described as ‘hilarious’.