Christina Sng is the Bram Stoker and Elgin Award-winning author of A Collection of Nightmares and Astropoetry. Her work has appeared in numerous venues worldwide and garnered over 70 awards and nominations, including the 2018 Jane Reichhold International Prize, the 2016 Harold G. Henderson Award, and Honourable Mentions in the Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror and the Best Horror of the Year.

 

Love Game

 

the memory

of your kiss

strawberries

 

granite moon

we clash wills

over another non-issue

 

deadwood

your reluctance

to hold my hand

 

solo dinner

quiet Monday

at the diner

 

old love

the rush I feel seeing you

still new

 

~

 

Housewife

 

motherhood

the soft curves

of a pear

 

sandwiched

by my children

three BLTs

 

sundown

the children’s voices

an octave higher

 

midnight repairs

pats on the back

I give myself

 

dusting

blissful thoughts

of oblivion

 

dry leaf

a life once

lived

 

 

~

 

Girl on Fire

For Minz and Maunz who had to see this

 

 

Little girl

Plays with matches

While her parents are out.

 

The cats wail for her to stop.

 

Too late!

The flames light her up

Like a Christmas tree

 

While her poor cats cry out for help.

 

She burns and burns

Till she is ash

And bone.

 

The cats weep a brook in their home.

 

 

(Reinterpreted from Heinrich Hoffmann’s Die gar traurige Geschichte mit dem Feuerzeug in Struwwelpeter)