VI. The Lovers (Reversed)

7 WAYS TO SEDUCE X
by Natalie Crick

1. Light his cold hive with my honey glow.
2. Creep on my spine like a strange flower
   and hoodwink him.
3. Hunger-eyed, feed him.
   Turn into his bone machine.
4. Know him as I know moles on my skin
   and know nothing of myself.
5. Live hinged on his daisy, glassed-in.
6. Hum a sad song until his chest opens up
   and a bird flies out.
7. Hate myself.

Natalie Crick (she/her), from Newcastle in the UK, has poems published in various journals including The Moth, Banshee, New Welsh Review, and elsewhere. She is studying for an MPhil in Creative Writing at Newcastle University. Her poetry has been nominated for The Pushcart Prize twice, shortlisted for The Anthony Cronin International Poetry Award 2018, commended in the 2019 Hippocrates Open Awards for Poetry and Medicine and one of her poems was a runner-up in the PBS & Mslexia Women’s Poetry Competition 2018, judged by Carol Ann Duffy. Natalie’s collaborative pamphlet is Co-Incidental 5 (The Black Light Engine Room Press, 2019).