Mer­cy Fer­rars has cre­at­ed a pho­tog­ra­phy series based on pho­tographs she took of a selec­tion of Berlin build­ings: the design offices locat­ed in Europac­i­ty, the futuri­um—”House of the Future”—and the Dutch Embassy to name a few. She dis­tort­ed them into a pho­to series speak­ing of sym­me­try and form. Includ­ed is a poem she wrote on the loss of a sun, which will be part of her 2022 release Death of a Sun. 

Snkllr Pt II 

You were anoth­er sun I burnt,
my favourite dead star.
I had always looked at you with the fond­ness 
of the moon await­ing day­break, 
a means to end the dark­ness 
before it col­lapsed, rip­ping apart the earth,
and left the moon with­out light or home.

And the cos­mos filled with the par­ti­cles 
of what could­n’t live on or vapor­ised as it awoke.
I burnt my favourite sun and placed it 
on a shelf with all the oth­ers.
This one nev­er pul­verised into ash­es and I nev­er for­got its name.
This one watched me dis­ap­pear and reap­pear until 
my skin was so thin 
my insides shone through.
This one lit up one dark night six cycles post destruc­tion 
and it knew all the right words 
to make my heart bleed the truth.

Of how I can’t explain why you were the only one who
has touched me like this with­out ever touch­ing me. 
And of how the pain ran so deep, 
know­ing we were tides, 
con­demned to kiss the coast in turns.
Our desire from afar bound tight­ly in a log­ic 
that drove us apart
always asyn­chro­nous­ly feed­ing into pur­pose­ful dreams.

What if you had nev­er been a sun but I had always been the moon? 
The day I stood by the ocean I could feel you breathe just at the hori­zon. 
I could always feel you close.
I had always kept up the imag­i­na­tion of
dream­ing of you in all the colours and all the places.
This was my ocean, I held it in the palm of my hands for you to see.
As the flood rushed salt water towards me, part of me
had always imag­ined you to be stand­ing there just across the water.
I felt you close when the sun fell and dawn set over my ocean, 
know­ing it would rise for yours soon.

I knew the dan­ger of suns and the
sus­cep­ti­bil­i­ty of the moon, 
eager­ly await­ing the caress of light on its 
brit­tle skin. 
Part of me knew it was impos­si­ble to come close.
Just this one time I wish I did­n’t need the fire because
the sky is dark around me already.

Snkllr will be pub­lished in Death of a Sun, a poet­ry anthol­o­gy released in fall 2022. More infor­ma­tion on www.mercyferrars.de and on Insta­gram (@snkllrpublications).

Mer­cy Fer­rars is a writer and pho­tog­ra­ph­er based in Berlin. She is mad­ly in love with Scot­land, dogs and Bojack Horseman.