Janus
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Natascha Sieg, Grade 12, John Curtin College of the Arts
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Poetry
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2016
Excellence Award in the 'Word Zone 2016' competition
Cold mornings make you sweat
in a body that is paradox.
When the sun rises and touches your skin
it is not your skin at all. It is plastic,
that you climbed into before putting on your clothes.
The face they cannot see, sees behind.
Like sitting backwards in a bus
and watching everything get pulled away.
That face is buried but ever-present,
shrivelled crispy skin, flaking off in the tailwind
of time.
Retreating through the door into sanctuary,
the silicon skin peels off you at the rate of nightfall.
And once again you are faced
with the door of the past and the door of the future–
two skins and none of them yours.