Medea

My heart is breaking, so I’m setting up my new Wonder Oven.
The waft of toxicity as I run it on empty for ten minutes
is a welcome distraction.
Do you know what a Wonder Oven is?
Let me tell you.
A Wonder Oven is so much more than just an airfryer.
It has six different functions. It doesn’t even
look like an airfryer; the ad on the Tube reminded me
of the toy oven I used to make stone soup in, lavender-seasoned
fistfuls of gravel from my grandmother’s garden.
My Wonder Oven is so perfect, it’s exactly what I need.
It can roast a 2kg chicken in 50 minutes.
It purrs like a lantern. My Wonder Oven
is pink, halfway between blush and bronzer,
a limited-edition colour the website called ‘Spice’.
I felt so lucky. Did I put on weight?
Maybe I did put on weight, I understand that’s what
happens to happy people. The sheer fucking whimsy of it.
It really does look like a toy, but it charrs like the real thing.
I am learning to swallow my children, even when
I’m not hungry. I’ve forgotten what hunger is. God,
the person I was when I ordered my Wonder Oven!
How long does it take to digest a child? My Wonder Oven
only took a week to arrive. It sits there like a torture chamber,
between the toaster and kettle, wafting.
I was going to buy him a kettle for Christmas. Have you ever
cared about anyone like that? Before the Wonder Oven,
I could never have understood how a woman
might bake her own children in a pie, her milk for liquor,
how she might not flinch
burning her knuckles on the oven door, the heating element
a twisted wire hanger. How she might transcend one final time
giving her man exactly what his mother asked for,
eye contact whilst he swallows, washing it down
with wine that isn’t wine.
I would give anything to be that animal
spread thickly over warm bread,
to excrete that animal.
My Wonder Oven dings when it’s done,
so I don’t even have to worry about keeping time.
Was home ever anything other than this?
The kitchen is so warm. It’s unbearable.

Ellora Sutton is a poet and PhD student based in Hampshire. Her work has been published in The Poetry Review, Oxford Poetry, Berlin Lit, and beyond. Her pamphlets include Antonyms for Burial (Poetry Book Society Spring 2023 Pamphlet Choice) and Artisanal Slush.