West Trade Review: "When I wish to feel abundance I go to IKEA" by Ewen Glass

Ewen Glass

When I wish to feel abundance I go to IKEA

and marvel at my own capacity for desire. Back at home, flat-pack is stacked flat, parallel to off-white ceilings, Billy bookcase on Billy bookcase. Little room left for the body I need, I need the body of the superstore with its curated promise. It's there that I entertain, in a vaguely European way, but my own delusions can be entertained for so long. Modular walls, paths of arrangement, I come to the place of small: cutlery holders, clothes-pegs, many-coloured chopping boards. I buy my ninth spatula. I could have a family at home, kids who insist on using spatulas as swords. I could have someone to flip an egg for.

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Image by Maria Orlova from Pexels

Ewen Glass is a screenwriter and poet from Northern Ireland who lives with two dogs, a tortoise and a body of self-doubt; his poetry has appeared in the likes of Okay Donkey, Maudlin House, HAD, Poetry Scotland and One Art Poetry. Bluesky/X/IG: @ewenglass

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