Click poem title for YouTube link
I slept so deeply I sank. Peacefully at first, then right through the mattress. Deeper still. Pulled down towards the centre of the earth. At the core I expected a furnace, but instead it was a solid ball of vivid red. I could feel my body warming; hotter and hotter as I got closer until it was intense and burning. I felt my legs begin to fuse. My body elongated into them. My head concaved. I was metal. Tightly packed atoms. No longer flesh. An enormous spoon sinking slowly. A giant could eat their porridge with me. Everything I had ever been was metallic. I don’t know who sent the mechanical grabber to lift me. But I know my brain fizzed and juddered as the claws spread open. I imagined being tugged up out of the depths. Wanted the grip to be true, to be held tight. I couldn’t face falling through a limp gap like a toy in the amusement arcades. Better to carry on sinking than to be lifted and dropped, lifted and dropped.
Sue Finch 