Marina Manoukian is an avid reader and a writer who sometimes dabbles in collage art. She currently resides in Berlin. She is pursuing a Masters in English Philology. Her poems “Senses Getting Fired” and “That Moment” are filled with sensations and memories of moments that we thought were gone forever.
SENSES GETTING FIRED
I used to think I’d rather lose hearing over sight. How would you read text how would
you read image.
No. It was never worth it to give up something so crucial. Being read to wouldn’t even come
close. Why trap stories in another’s voice when you could have the ability to soak them in at
your own pace, in your own head, in your own way.
But I forgot that without hearing then you can’t hear another come. You can’t hear a gasp or
a whisper, neither a melody nor a whimper. Nothing changes with the turn of a head
because everything is already drowning in a cloud. It’s just you and your thoughts, left alone,
supervised by that incessant ringing, only there to remind you that you’re still awake. In
dreams you can hear but then why bother waking up to emptiness. Watching arms and
bodies twist around one another doesn’t hold a candle to hearing a groan in the crook of
your neck. I’d rather blow out that candle and welcome darkness just to hear our pants echo.
Even if you can feel the touch of a hand on your back it’s not the same without the murmur
of two skins. Touch can’t exist in a vacuum.
THAT MOMENT
ever have that moment where just for a breath you’re back at your cubby grabbing the
ziplock bag of cookies and everything is little with the smell of new rather than smoked.
or you taste that sensation in your mouth and remember it from somewhere in a small bed
in a crib but you just can’t place it.
when you can remember feeling trapped in an incapable body
when you can still remember
when you were still
**
Illustrations by Maria Uve
