Walton
Street
Serena Alagappan
Burnt sugar spotted fingertips red-brown
like henna. Ornamental mud both sweet
and blistered. It looks ugly as it fades.
I would have sucked out the stains
if I’d been given the chance. I want to
laugh, and I want to shiver with the girl
perched on the barbecue, her personal
wheelbarrow, tearing down Walton hooked to
her sweetheart’s bicycle. Still, I hear those
peals and I wonder if it’s true what you
said, that I am a flippant creature.
like henna. Ornamental mud both sweet
and blistered. It looks ugly as it fades.
I would have sucked out the stains
if I’d been given the chance. I want to
laugh, and I want to shiver with the girl
perched on the barbecue, her personal
wheelbarrow, tearing down Walton hooked to
her sweetheart’s bicycle. Still, I hear those
peals and I wonder if it’s true what you
said, that I am a flippant creature.
Serena Alagappan’s debut poetry chapbook, Sensitive to Temperature (Smith|Doorstop, 2023), received the New Poets Prize. She is a candidate for the MFA in Poetry from NYU and currently works as a senior editor at Poets & Writers.
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