Clean
Dia Bhojwani
​
it is the fourth of september
and i am beyond redemption.
the bedroom so messy my mother
can’t marie kondo her way out.
the dishes stacked like the
tower of babel, the only
comprehensible language the
scarlet slick of pasta sauce.
i scrape dirty wax out
of peach scented candles
and shut all the dollhouse doors.
i organise my meds by colour and
name my saints under my breath,
a cough-syrup heavy prayer.
fluvoxamine. melatonin. concerta.
i taste the knife’s edge
pleasure of being unbearable.
the sweetness of week old
sweat snarled into the
grey down of my sweatshirt.
i miss being clean.
i want to get off the couch
and wash my hair, tender fingers
unknitting my knots in warm water.
so i wash myself and then the dishes.
i put self pity away with the laundry.
it is the fourth of september
and I am still fixable.
Dia Bhojwani (they/he/she) is a 17-year-old writer, editor, and all-around rascal from Mumbai, India. They’ve been published in Polyphony Lit, Parallax, and the Hearth Mag, amongst others. They’ve won awards from Lune Spark, Wingword, the Seamus Heaney Center, and most recently, were the recipient of the 2021 Claudia Ann Seaman Prize for Fiction. When not writing, they’re listening to Hozier, watching stand-up, and eating copious amounts of Hawaiian pizza.