Temporary Paralysis

neptune

we are simply the universe interacting with itself, a tentative touch, a shared breath.

and we must be tender with each other, for we are fragile

and we are real,

and you are real.

and you know yourself best, so you should know best that you are deserving of joy and every delicate softness that you stop to rub your cheek against, to feel that conjoining of two forgiving things.

to know that you can love, wanton and gorgeous, sunlit smile touched by every person who has treated you with care,

and possibly treat someone else with care, too.

you can have everything you want, dear

you only have to know that you deserve it

you only have to forgive yourself

dread has no place in our ecosystem, in our tangled, finite hearts

we are the universe, of the same stardust sprinkled onto fertile soil

we are the universe, nursed and nurtured into our positions

we are the universe, laid gently to rest when we are done

we are the universe, and we can help make it a little more bearable before we take our final bow.

don’t go chasing the rest, darling, because you can care without reciprocation

you can simply love

and it is a vulnerability, yes, but not a weakness

it is not a weakness.

agape

i love him the most in the gentleness of sleep,

he is at his softest then

eyes closing to the sounds of the world,

nose buried against my leg

claws retracted,

mouth soft and yielding

no twitch of the ear,

nor flicker of the eye,

vulnerability earned and cherished,

a kiss and gentle pet accepted,

i adore you most in the quiet of the night,

sparkling eyes slip shut,

soft belly bared to the world

breaths even and unmeasured,

curled up, awaiting

indefinitely, unknown

smoke and mirrors

i want you to make me pretty

unmake who i was beneath your hands

take all my soft parts and sharpen me

press me to you to find no curved edge

i want you to push down where it hurts

i want you to yield me a secret

you can’t break something already broken

i already know you'll never keep it

don’t ask to know me,

go on, make me anew

see me where no one has seen

i can pretend i was what you drew

look in the places that matter the least,

lick the tears from my cheeks and bite down

strip me to skin to skin, but

there will always be space, no matter how thin

i want you to taste me

take a day or two to wash the scent

miss me when i’m gone; won’t you?

convince me not to pretend

it isn’t kind, is it? to yourself, nor i

making mirrors and posing and refracting light

you can try, but we’ll never see eye to eye

even when silk drape isn’t on your mind

smoke and mirrors, painful prayer, nothing to see

you will never make a beggar of me

on spring

pastel sunrise, mottled green

flower bloom, thawed stream

spring is upon us, the air is clean

crisp cloud cuts the sky

and there’s a gleam in your eye

an adventure there, and i want to follow

outstretched hand, t-shirts at dusk

grassy knoll, abandoned park

mosquitos buzz and bat them away

air cool and perfumed with the breeze of the day

and there’s a bed waiting when you get home

and the silence is warm when you’re alone

sky open above you and dizzy with fear

the grip of nostalgia never felt so real

until now, grass flat beneath your back

and sand between toes, pretty rock in backpack

teetering on the precipice of all you have known

at once still so young, at once so near grown

living felt stagnant but the answer was clear

every me nested in me, stacked years upon years

the coming of spring still awakens such thrill

and the promise of budding spreads dreams anew:

this was never a middle, as the pond is never still

but the beginning of everything, and everything that will

summer

summer strings you out and stretches you

leaves you to dry like meat on a wire

frayed thin, tendons close to snapping

nothing but hot skin and buzzing flies

rough sheets and restless nights

summer is seamless and raw

leaves you prickly and itching all over

flushed cheeks and peeling skin,

tantalizing and torrefied

like something shaped for burning,

like something waiting to be set alight

excerpt from ch 9

Zela’s place was not here. Not in this restaurant, not with these people. The sooner she recognized that, the sooner she could get over it.

Wiping angry tears from her blotchy face, she rushed out into the cool night air, retreating to the safety of her car.

She slammed the steering wheel. Once. Twice. And then she crumpled.

Was it so bad to have company pride? To love what she did? Should she not adore her workplace and the people who worked there?

She fished out the rook, placing it gently on the dashboard. She still remembered it as if it were yesterday – Christmas, age twelve. The snow was falling hard outside, and Zela had woken up to a wonderland blizzard. The family had stayed inside, yelling in joy, chasing each other, wrapping paper strewn across the carpet. Her father had swung Malin around, who, of course, was jubilant. Zela watched, wanting to join, but Darren couldn’t hold two daughters at once. So her mother had pulled her from behind, shouting and grinning. She had brought down the chessboard from the shelf, and said with candy eyes and a nutmeg tongue, I think it’s time you learned the game.

Zela refused to stop until she won, but hours passed, and she couldn’t. After her fourth checkmate by the rook and a break for dinner, Zela snuck the piece off the board. Her mother pretended not to notice. Kita won anyway – but she never asked for the piece back.

Zela didn’t win that day. Nor could she the next, or the next week, or the next month.

Within the year, they were at a stalemate. After a year, Zela was consistently winning.

After two years, Zela started high school. According to her mother, there wasn’t time for chess anymore. There wasn’t time for family.

Her chest ached.

She still remembered the scent, the laughter. The warmth of four bodies in the same room. She still remembered the music. 

Zela exhaled, half expecting to see her breath puff before her. But it was summer, and the snow hadn’t come in years. 

elpis

nobody taught me what happiness was,

i had to teach myself.

i sought it in a golden fleece,

but it wasn’t found in riches

i sought it in the thunderbolt,

but it wasn’t found in god

i sought it in my mother’s hand,

but she never learned it either

i sought it in my own heart,

but the feeling wouldn’t linger.

nobody taught me what happiness was,

it’s simpler to stay sad

you have to save yourself, i realized

it’s easier said than done

when you’ve convinced yourself you don’t need saving,

that the bone-deep hurt is in everyone.

i made myself happy enough, i bluffed but i should’ve known

enough is never enough

my heart was never my home

i flayed myself at the altar

i bent backwards for pelias

his upward gaze did not falter, 

a midas touch could not settle the rest.

there was no reason, none at all

but i could not accept it,

i think i've always been a little scared of happiness

for me, it was never destined. 

nobody taught me what happiness was,

but i’m trying to learn it now

i’m sorry i hurt so easy

i’m sorry i didn’t treat you well

i’m sorry i stayed complacent, couldn’t face it, didn’t cherish what you gave me 

i hope you can forgive this 

i hope you trust me with your gift

i’d turn back for you, every single time

for one sun-dappled glimpse.

nobody taught me what happiness was,

i think i figured it out.

it's trying, with everything you have, to find it

you owe it to yourself.

breezeblock

it is beautiful, quietly beautiful

it needs no announcement nor gaudy proclamation of arrival

gentle patter of snowfall,

whispered brush of leaf

it is there through blustering sunshine

it is there in deadened sleep

the silence is a thing in itself, the

backdrop of every play

you are never not without it

it's patient, it lies in wait

and when you are ready for it, though you may never be

going out a thing of rage,

riotous against the peace

they'll tie you to the bed

and you'll spit out useless fury

it will greet you, with open arms and heart

it begs you to forgive

but you're animal, not god

and love spawns hatred in your heart

when you're tired and heaving

back bent and wrists red,

the silence will creep

aimless night will descend

and if you've never lived without sound

the quiet is unfamiliar, in the end

it's just you and the trees, and they're scary, yes

but they are soft,

but they are friend

three thousand

the days pass so quickly,

resolutions so fickle

and there is something old, very old, inside me

that spits on it all

the lecherous gluttony and

sick indulgence, stuffing soft, pink bellies

full to bursting

built into that, a stopping point

the shining stretch of flesh, hesitant,

untested, afraid to try

energy must exist in equal balance,

and the beast takes

yawning cavernous hunger,

a need never satiated, swallowing the world.

hurting, hunting,

it does not forget – it does not want to forget.

content in its loathing, superior in a void.

hating and hating.

but it forgets itself

fed by another hand, before it learned to take.

hurt by another's mouth, before it learned to snap

someone else's creation, it is not itself

it is residue,

it is fear

the days pass so quickly,

without reprieve, in delay

i walk alongside them,

and the beast always stays.

from a fall walk home

i walked a stranger's footsteps today,

there seemed a poem in that

i turned my feet to match his gait

slowed mine to his own crooked path

he walked with haste irregular

tempo change could not meet the eye

but i felt it, for a minute, we were one

on that path, in that space, he and i

he does not know, for a minute there

another walked his rhythym

his stride was longer, his steps were quicker

perhaps he sought to make haste

and sure, it was weird

he would have found it so, too

but for that minute i was him in delay

i understood his perception

and the give of his limbs

i knew of his body's affections

soon our steps fell into disfavor

before leaf underfoot gave way

we were entities once more, unique paths on the ground

before my door, i turned but he walked away

maybe i will see him again, on my mellow walk home

maybe our eyes will connect

i would not know him by feature nor face

but maybe i’d fall into step

and recognize a gait from a dream long ago

a temporal space once inhabited

it was you, i would think, i was you for a minute

and we’d pass by and walk on again