Moulting to divest

Words and photos by Achille Filipponi

“It’s a poem that speaks ofchange as death and rebirth; my mother, who was about to die while I was being born, is a paradigm of this. A parable going from my birth to her possible death.”

Moulting to divest
then journey’s end
and panic attack, visiting
the new placenta
struggling to breathe clearly
everything out
everything on fire
new teeth
new lips
first name
yours,
diving outwards
where I don’t yet know 
a tiny window 
with even god inside
Wagnerian passage
wherein I die we are born,
I felt nothing more than myself
superficially decent in a black pit
that you won’t clear out,
dear mum
I love you
and I’m afraid
you’re going to die.

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