Tag: David Hanlon

Two Poems by David Hanlon

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On coming out

Watch how I Anna’s hummingbird
in disclosing sunlight
my crown & throat
all magenta iridescence
from which I unburden
from which I sing

*

If I saw myself then as I do now

I’d see not a child
flailing
but a baby walrus
already wrinkled
a baby walrus needing
to speed-grow
adult tusks
long & pointed
longer than his own body

I’d see
just how often
he digs them
into the sea ice
of his small life
to make breathing
holes in it
to haul his weighted body
out of those frigid
& predatory waters

*

David Hanlon is a poet from Cardiff, Wales. You can find his work online in many magazines and journals, including Rust & Moth, Barren Magazine, The Lumiere Review & trampset. His first full-length collection Dawn’s Incision was recently published with Icefloe Press. You can follow him on twitter @davidhanlon13 and Instagram @hanlon6944

Masculinity by David Hanlon

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Masculinity

I had to wear it every day
despite
how ill-fitted it was
how badly I reacted
to its rough material
like battery acid
on my tender skin
so easily cut and chewed
and spat out
by boys who wore it better
my costume so oversized
it hung
off my scrawny body
in foreboding drapes
trousers too wide and too long
falling
down and gathering at my feet
tripping over the excess
subjugation
countless cuts and bruises
14 years old and weeping
to 80’s power ballads
I listen to them now
and feel nothing
but shame
disrobing itself
my form exposed
able

*

David Hanlon is a poet from Cardiff, Wales. He is a Best of the Net nominee. You can find his work online in over 50 magazines, including Rust & Moth, Kissing Dynamite & Homology Lit. His first chapbook Spectrum of Flight is available for purchase now at Animal Heart Press. You can follow him on twitter @davidhanlon13 and Instagram @welshpoetd

Changing rooms by David Hanlon

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Changing rooms

long wooden benches
no backs
oversized white shorts
string vests
pink/pale flesh
hairless legs

rows of coat hook rails
uniformed hooks
soldiers’ heads
floating
decapitated

I’m wearing
my new two-tone Nike trainers
boys remark
half-discuss
how cool they are

before one boy
the most popular
highest-ranking
disagrees
profusely

then gay boy
gay boy gay boy gay boy
with gay trainers

*

David Hanlon is a poet from Cardiff, Wales. He is a Best of the Net nominee. You can find his work online in over 50 magazines, including Rust & Moth, Kissing Dynamite & Homology Lit. His first chapbook Spectrum of Flight is available for purchase now at Animal Heart Press. You can follow him on twitter @davidhanlon13 and Instagram @welshpoetd