suggestions are made based on mutual friends, work
and education information, networks you’re a part of,
contacts you’ve imported and many other factors

Your old flatmate and
The chair of the orchestra
Where you first learnt what shame means.
The boy who disappeared from school one day,
It says you have a treatment centre in common.
The man who sorted your post today or
The nurse who will take your blood next month.

The ghost of your father,
He hasn’t spoken for years.
Last week you saw him on the street and
Wanted to thank him for all the ways he changed you,
His bio asks why you turned away instead.
The woman you spoke to in your dreams last night,
You think she might’ve told you how you’ll die.

A lady from Wisconsin:
She has the same face as you,
A whole family you’ve never met.
Your god become corporeal,
A second self, built from dead skin,
The sibling your mother miscarried
A year before you were born.

—Published 1st of September 2025

About Evelyn Byrne

Evelyn Byrne is a writer, printmaker and river dweller. Based in the Midlands in the UK she is a former Poetry Society Young Critic and can be found on Instagram @emlbhandprinted