I Wanted to Be a Bird
After Leonora Carrington
The being inside me is standing under a lucid
sky that tears darks to become alive.
The being inside me is watched by other beings.
The being inside me has eyes on its ankles
to rise from a sun spell with hoofed feet.
The being inside me moves its secret wings.
The being inside me is an unborn bird, spinning
its own egg to engrave my future as a poet.
The being inside me is the watcher of my writing.
The being inside me is living radiantly to die
to be reborn again from its own body.
The being inside me is my love of dying.
Özge Lena‘s poems have appeared in The London Magazine, iamb, Ink Sweat & Tears, Green Ink Poetry, Verse of April, Dark Winter, The Mantelpiece, Sky Island Journal, The Selkie, and elsewhere in various countries including the UK, the USA, Canada, Iceland, and France. She was nominated both for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. Her poem “Celestial Body” was selected for Flight of the Dragonfly Press’ 2023 anthology Take Flight. Özge’s poetry was shortlisted for the Ralph Angel Poetry Prize and the Oxford Brookes International Poetry Competition in 2021, as well as for The Plough Poetry Prize in 2023.
The Marbled Sigh 