This work was first published in Spread the Word’s Young Writers Collective Anthology, 2025. This anthology stands as a testament to the courage, creativity, and growth of a remarkable group of young poets who have spent seven months exploring the power of language and self-expression. The anthology is more than a collection of poems—it is a celebration of emerging voices, of stories told with boldness and vulnerability.
All of the poems can be read here on our website, or you can download the Young Writer’s Collective Anthology to read as a PDF.
Ghazal for Single Sided Deafness by Anya Hunt-Byer
Sometimes, a newborn babe is born congenitally deaf, Her inner ear asleep, boneless, compartmentally deaf.
Her redeemer arrives with scalpel and batteries, eager to fix her. On her knees, lacking equilibrium— pray-for-me- deaf?
Hearing words like 2D protocol – unilateral deaf,
Man’s explicit tongues captioned by fistfuls of bleeding palms, tonally deaf.
Their savoirism tries to kiss her, something to sink their teeth into, She reels the cost- they devour and love us, horribly deaf.
She wonders what it means to love a woman, freely.
The answer? No dissection, no cure, just truth- Queerly deaf.
One foot implanted, cochlear ablaze, she kisses you.
Religion becomes her fingerpicking guitars and you’re listening
Missing the beat-
Of abstract notes
sounds fistful,
hearing aid batteries
entangled.
In such moments,
she wouldn’t change her
circumstances for the world.
Freely deaf.
Blissfully deaf.
Exceptionally deaf.
O O
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About Anya Hunt-Byer
Anya Hunt-Byer (she/they)is a writer, actor, and artist. Her work explores the complexities of Sapphic love and the disabled experience. In 2024, Anya debuted on stage at Theatre Peckham with Poetic Unity’s Spoken Word Theatre Company and showcased their art in NC Production’s “Shades of Resistance” exhibition at the Bomb Factory, Marylebone. Anya trained at the Oxford School of Drama on their foundation course and holds a First Class Honours degree in Creative Writing from Birkbeck University.