Deborrah Corr has earned an Honorable Mention in Streetlight’s 2024 Poetry Contest
The red onion
is a purple globe.
I hold it, let my skin
adore its slick,
smooth contours.
Then I bear down
with a knife. A slice
reveals a maze.
No, I’ve misspoken.
I’m mistaken.
There are no passages
with doorways
through which you
wander, puzzled how
to get to the center
and find your way
back again.
Just white corridors,
inescapable layers,
lined in lilac. Rotating,
arriving always
where you started.
I begin to think
monotony. I think
hospital hallways,
blank anxiety.
No arriving
at the center.
Let me start again,
wipe away sulfuric
tears and squeeze
inside the tiny curves,
the quiet pressure
of repetition. I could
so gladly circle here,
drifting through
the violet light, letting
the onion’s magic
empty my eyes.




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