Domestic Constellation
Valentina Cano
She tears at the skin
that drools with the memory of fluid.
She watches herself bend,
a bag shaking itself empty.
She wants to fold away,
plastic edge by plastic edge,
until she is just one sharpened corner
pressed against the sky.
that drools with the memory of fluid.
She watches herself bend,
a bag shaking itself empty.
She wants to fold away,
plastic edge by plastic edge,
until she is just one sharpened corner
pressed against the sky.
Listen to Valentina read the poem here:
Working notes
I suffer from severe depression and sometimes the only way to get outside myself is to write. I wrote this when I was going through one of my bouts of illness. The idea of emptying myself out seemed like something I would have paid money to experience at the time.
About the author

Valentina Cano is a student of classical singing who spends whatever free time either writing or reading. Her works have appeared in Exercise Bowler, Blinking Cursor, Theory Train, Cartier Street Press, Berg Gasse 19, Precious Metals, A Handful of Dust, The Scarlet Sound, The Adroit Journal, Perceptions Literary Magazine, Welcome to Wherever, The Corner Club Press, Death Rattle, Danse Macabre, Subliminal Interiors, Generations Literary Journal, A Narrow Fellow, Super Poetry Highway, Stream Press, Stone Telling, Popshot, Golden Sparrow Literary Review, Rem Magazine, Structo, The 22 Magazine, The Black Fox Literary Magazine, Niteblade, Tuck Magazine, Ontologica, Congruent Spaces Magazine, Pipe Dream, Decades Review, Anatomy, Lowestof Chronicle, Muddy River Poetry Review, Lady Ink Magazine, Spark Anthology, Awaken Consciousness Magazine, Vine Leaves Literary Magazine, Avalon Literary Review, Caduceus,White Masquerade Anthology and Perhaps I'm Wrong About the World. Her poetry has been nominated for Best of the Web and the Pushcart Prize. You can find her here: http://carabosseslibrary.blogspot.com