henry bladon

When I saw a starlet on a sunless sunbed
reading a book by the pool
I noticed that all the pages were filled
with question marks.

This set me wondering about
my Amazon browsing history,
which is littered with ornaments
I will never need and books
on how to survive an avalanche.

Eventually my brain started
to smell like a car tyre
after a long motorway trip.

I took a drink from my can of 7Up
and a stray blonde hair filament
got stuck in my throat.

is a writer, poet, and mental health essayist based in Somerset, U.K. He has a PhD in literature and creative writing from the University of Birmingham. He is the author of several poetry collections and his work can be seen in Poetica Review, Pure Slush, and Lunate, among other places.