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Counting Sheep

By Anjali Natarajan

Illustration by Iuniki Dkhar

I’m counting sheep on their hills, butterflies on silk screens, cherries on Black Forest cake, and vitamins in rainbow cups. I can’t fall asleep. I have to move out of my mother’s house before I turn into a pumpkin. I need to learn how to quilt. I need to learn how to garden, to keep my cabinets organized, to make my bed, to pay my taxes, to call her once every month, to make sure ivy doesn’t grow between the cracks of my walls. It would infest my ceiling with poisonous flowers.

Pollen falls from pink flowers,

Tickles my nose as I sleep. I no longer dream, and I never notice.


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Posted On: January 14, 2026
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