A woman laughed
and told me
I owed her
a souvenir
from every city
on my trip.
And afraid
of some secret
earnestness,
I returned
with an armful
of trinkets.
But she had already
disappeared, so
I kept the flowers,
liqueur and soap
and was better
for the trade.
As a child, I’d sit in church
and imagine gravity reversing,
wondering if I’d unhook my chair
in time to cushion the fall
as I plunged upwards
into steel scaffolding.
The sermon would fade
while I imagined a chasm
tearing open between my feet
or imagined drowning in black
shingles as the roof collapsed
and gave us our eternity early.
My eyes glazed and I dreamt
whether I was brave enough
to escape those disasters,
or brave enough to simply stand
and walk out on my parents,
still rapt and reverent.
But each of those young visions
felt equally impossible
until I was a little older.
The internet
has taught us all
to speak like
advertisements
but instead
of getting either
rich or angry,
we polish
our cacophony
thankful for
the attention.
I watched my body expand and contract
with the Thames’ wet tides, in denial
that I was the one inside that soft fat,
the hard arteries and tendons,
and neuroses disguised as character.
I carried a heart so metaphorical
it stopped functioning as an organ,
though tonight a Basque singer
makes her case with melody
for my blood to be blood again.
“Maybe you identify as the child
in class that was different?
It would be great to be normal
in your own way. I haven’t been alive
always, but it feels that way.”
A man on the bus asked, “why do
you cross your legs like that?” and I said
it was more comfortable.
“Because it’s more comfortable!”
he parroted and laughed,
slumping over in his happy victory.
Pain turned me inward
and calcified me in spirals
like a saltwater shell
echoing its distant chorus
of breaking waves.
I spoke in repetition,
harmonizing with barstools
and a decade of lyrics
memorized in foresight.
I beat the eardrums
of old friends and hard drinkers,
until we slept together
in the white noise.
But that endless din
became a shelter
for my sore throat,
still raucous and acid,
to find its melody.
Slowly and singing
my bitter tune,
the empathy I lost
in self-preservation,
I regained in double.
Home does not come to me
in careful images of my memory,
but in distant, violent flashes
like a psychic vision
of some grand former life.
And I am reincarnated daily
by London’s expanse,
fresh imprints of
hot reds and greens—
neon and christmas and curry.
But Seattle’s black sidewalks
still cough with smoke,
breathe with moss,
and brighten the back
of my eyelids.
I would possess Oklahoma too
in these astral projections
but avoid chance encounters
with the unkind spirit
of my past self.
I was a nerve
vibrating in the dark
when we first ignored
the imperfections
of each other’s bodies
and then, with enough practice,
forgave the imperfections
of our own.
I was my age
but halved or doubled,
holding back an explanation
for my scars, a narrative
for my roughness
in shape and texture.
I was a cold body
prepared for internment
and I never thought
to categorize each muscle
as developed or undeveloped
until I showed them to you.
I was an impression
of alive, awake, and sober
as we met in the space
you gave me.
The water stood, clapped black rocks,
bowed, and retreated.
I fought to keep my head above
as the horizon bounced endlessly.
Three swimmers leapt
from volcanic cliffs into cold chop.
Their brown bodies strong
in white, neon, and aquamarine.
One watched me, hoping
he would not need to save me.
I foamed and spat salt. The roughness
tossed me lightly and caught me hard.
I swam until current raked me to shore
and I stood tenderfoot on red sand.
A new capacity opened in me,
a space and ache I had forgotten.
The stones settled, a woman sunned,
the wind sung and I evaporated.
Wooden box on tiny shelf,
purse within a purse,
or distant desk drawer.
Nothing more honest
than learning where
the condoms are kept.