'What does one want in any body but the world?'
1.
The other day,
I drove to the pond we grew up near.
I don't know how to drive
And the distance will always be too much or too little
For a drive,
But that day, I drove.
It was quiet, it always is.
When I say quiet, I don't mean silence, I don't mean peace,
I mean the stillness we knew to be palpable
To be so delicate that even whispering it would be
Acknowledging it
And acknowledging it would mean
Destroying
The silence which was truly that.
It's a safe space, not because it offers comfort,
But because it doesn't offer danger.
In the recent past, I've learnt that.
I've learnt that how are you is a question spilling over with potential
And doesn't necessarily formally inquire after your emotional state
I've learnt We exist in the spaces we create
Between our individual selves
And we can't breathe when we talk because
You can accept either the words or the air that existed in a body.
I'd rather take the air because there is something you can't control
And swerve and veer and stop and slam the door on
And there is no safety valve, no fire escape, no water to swallow pills
No first aid no punctuation no rehearsal
No moments of indecision over conversations and situations you handpicked
And stitched together in a patchwork of
Bad sentences, bad beginnings, terrible conclusions, a body that
I completely ignored because of the ringing in my ears.
No, I'd rather take your heavy breathing into my mouth
And your heavy breathing when you slam the door
And believe that both of them is love.
2.
I watched the light break open against
The surface of the pond
And ripple through the water into a somersault of fire.
Some part of me still believes
Everything I touch can burst into daggers of light.
That is the part I want introduced to the quiet
Because there is so much that is wrong about
Thinking of breaking open and thinking your fundamental state
Involves thousands of glinting daggers.
When I was really young, I read this story where
Somebody killed so-and-so and created mouths
That only spoke silence because that is what the dagger- god
Created them to be.
They did not need to speak betrayal to claim betrayal.
In my head, each mouth was purple and red and drinking in the air
Like tasting a slow, long drag of smoke
Before letting go.
Like each wound chose air because there was something
In the silence that the words would be interrupting.
3.
Interrupt me
With your silences.
Interrupt me
By your presence.
Interrupt me.
Break my silences with the sound
Of air.
I do not need your voice to twist around and form words
That let themselves into the receptacle of my senses
-My senses are vacant.
I need what comes naturally
The rise, the fall, the ebb, the rise again
That steady rhythm that is permanent
The constant presence that
I will find shadows of in every person I meet
That requires nothing of us
Except to simply be.
I need.
What comes naturally.
Consume me.
Drink in the silence I have to offer.
Accept the air I have drunk and let go of like the thousand
Words of love and hate whose meaning we've destroyed
Time and time again.
Teach me again
How is it that we breathe.
1.
The other day,
I drove to the pond we grew up near.
I don't know how to drive
And the distance will always be too much or too little
For a drive,
But that day, I drove.
It was quiet, it always is.
When I say quiet, I don't mean silence, I don't mean peace,
I mean the stillness we knew to be palpable
To be so delicate that even whispering it would be
Acknowledging it
And acknowledging it would mean
Destroying
The silence which was truly that.
It's a safe space, not because it offers comfort,
But because it doesn't offer danger.
In the recent past, I've learnt that.
I've learnt that how are you is a question spilling over with potential
And doesn't necessarily formally inquire after your emotional state
I've learnt We exist in the spaces we create
Between our individual selves
And we can't breathe when we talk because
You can accept either the words or the air that existed in a body.
I'd rather take the air because there is something you can't control
And swerve and veer and stop and slam the door on
And there is no safety valve, no fire escape, no water to swallow pills
No first aid no punctuation no rehearsal
No moments of indecision over conversations and situations you handpicked
And stitched together in a patchwork of
Bad sentences, bad beginnings, terrible conclusions, a body that
I completely ignored because of the ringing in my ears.
No, I'd rather take your heavy breathing into my mouth
And your heavy breathing when you slam the door
And believe that both of them is love.
2.
I watched the light break open against
The surface of the pond
And ripple through the water into a somersault of fire.
Some part of me still believes
Everything I touch can burst into daggers of light.
That is the part I want introduced to the quiet
Because there is so much that is wrong about
Thinking of breaking open and thinking your fundamental state
Involves thousands of glinting daggers.
When I was really young, I read this story where
Somebody killed so-and-so and created mouths
That only spoke silence because that is what the dagger- god
Created them to be.
They did not need to speak betrayal to claim betrayal.
In my head, each mouth was purple and red and drinking in the air
Like tasting a slow, long drag of smoke
Before letting go.
Like each wound chose air because there was something
In the silence that the words would be interrupting.
3.
Interrupt me
With your silences.
Interrupt me
By your presence.
Interrupt me.
Break my silences with the sound
Of air.
I do not need your voice to twist around and form words
That let themselves into the receptacle of my senses
-My senses are vacant.
I need what comes naturally
The rise, the fall, the ebb, the rise again
That steady rhythm that is permanent
The constant presence that
I will find shadows of in every person I meet
That requires nothing of us
Except to simply be.
I need.
What comes naturally.
Consume me.
Drink in the silence I have to offer.
Accept the air I have drunk and let go of like the thousand
Words of love and hate whose meaning we've destroyed
Time and time again.
Teach me again
How is it that we breathe.
