Özge Lena

Dreams of Pink

Like a dream dreamed by four
legged creatures lying on the acid

pink frost of the grass, staring at the sun
burst sky. Like a dream dreamed by a goat

headed man, one horn broken, ash pink
worms blazoning the other, dancing

on the ice, with twelve other goat heads
behind, bleating a song of lust. Like a dream

dreamed by a winged being, naked under her plum
coloured plumes, half asleep, tied to a last tree.

Like a dream dreamed by the tree foaming
fuchsia flowers with the teeth of snakes hiding

inside their innocent petals. Like a dream dreamed
by the wind whining under scar pink clouds,

plucking the flowers, whirling them on a field
of rust, poison pink rain, sudden, merging

into the fire circling the woman. Like a dream
dreamed by thirteen half-men, fallen down like

fallen glaciers, half alive with flesh pink mouths
screaming out in pain. Like a dream dreamed

by feathers, carrying a thing up into the real
ity of the evening, free from the dreams of pink.

Like a dream everything and every being was cut
and dried. It was like a dream a dream dreamed.

Author Reading

About the Author

Özge Lena is a poet and English language teacher based in Istanbul. She has one published novella, Otopsi (The Autopsy). Her poems have appeared in Ink Sweat & Tears, Green Ink Poetry, Fragmented Voices, Harana, Swim Press, The Phare, After, and elsewhere, and are also forthcoming in iamb. Her poetry was shortlisted for the Ralph Angel Poetry Prize 2021 judged by Mary Ruefle and her poem Summerlepsy was shortlisted for the 2021 Oxford Brookes International Poetry Competition.