MOUTH SUTURE

by Rina Shamilov 

air         swells 

in utero/ my ephemeral 

cells seek 

last month’s     unsprung 

       leakage// the pulp of my breasts lumps into 

juice/ 

           fig-phlegm / pomegranate ache 

 

      my nipples inflate like a pregnant gut: balloon womb’s 

      silent, unoxidized blood/ purples under oxygen’s blue touch 

fetus’ heal stabs my 

    left kidney / drinks- – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – clear-as-sky-urine/ licks blood

 

    & digs thru cartilage/ 

its gelatine limbs pulse 

along 

       my thighs, my finger’s sliver/ i 

   unlatch | wires | to | other | holes 

       plug up my body’s roots // w/ figs 

   my quiet mouth/ dries stiff as velvet/ runs on yesterday’s hormone

 

i eat fog breath/ slurp spit from tongue’s whites/ & deflate

Rina Shamilov is a poet and visual artist from Brooklyn, New York. Her poetry explores self, grief, family, and movement, and she writes to preserve memory and feeling. She is a nonfiction editor at MAYDAY and a managing editor at the Notre Dame Review. Her work has either been published or is forthcoming in The Foundationalist, Club Plum Lit, Mulberry Literary, Pink Disco, Udolpho, The Laurel Review, Kismet Magazine, Ranger, Heavy Feather Review, and Another Chicago Magazine, among others. Her chapbook, My Mother’s Armoire, was recently published by Bottlecap Press. Several poems from her collection have received an honorable mention for the 2025 Billy Maich award at the University of Notre Dame, sponsored by the Academy of American Poets. She has written nonfiction pieces for Lilith, The Forward, and New Voices, where she serves as an arts and culture editor.