The Marbled Sigh

After Narges Mohammadi ¹

in a prison of                            resist

clatter locks                              chains

concrete walls                      coarse blankets   

blindfolds                              disrupt senses 

slits in cells                           control light

sleep day                                awake light 

filthy toilet                            olfactory assault 

 

food is                                       bland

unchanging                               dry

bread                                        to ants 

tea in                                      plastic cup

separates                                body from

the soul                                 annihilates

humanity                           from the wound

take women                       from the prayer                                       

 

woman

vanish

like scratched 

poems   

scratched white

torture on the walls

 

 

                                            fill the world with women, with poems

 

 

 

1. Words and images reformed from White Torture, Interviews with Iranian Women Prisoners by Narges Mohammadi ↩︎

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Katherine Breeden is an American poet and teacher living in Germany. Katherine was a semi-finalist in the 2024 Editor’s Broadside Series with Lefty Blondie Press. Her work also has been published with Abobo Zine Vol. 2, Réapparition Lit, Anodyne Magazine and is forthcoming with The Selkie.