FATHERS WHO WERE SOLDIERS CAN’T PLAY HIDE AND SEEK, IT’S IN THE MANIFESTO SIS

Yaz Nin

There was a god here once 

my father told us in his mother’s empty house 

My sister then six

leaning against a white wall overcrowded with family portraits 

moaned with braided hair and pink flip flops

But why can’t we play hide and seek?

My sister now 27 

still hasn’t forgiven our father 

she makes a show and tell 

when playing hide and seek with her children 

See Baba this is how it’s done!

I did not tell her

last summer

when rearranging the portraits in the godless house 

I forced her children to wriggle their fingers in the bullet holes  

gold framed portraits had been hiding

Yaz Nin is a Kibris born – Tottenham raised poet and playwright. Her poems have recently been published in The other side of hope and Oxford Poetry. When not sitting in a hospital waiting room she can be found reading or writing – but would always rather be in the woods with Mojo the dog.