I don’t do fiction – “Pretty, Curly Girl” March 2017

20170430_115718

17 billion universes, in each of which I am a thousand possibilities. I carry in me the seeds for a hundred women to flower.

Yet I am afraid. As if a single uncontrolled step might condemn me to a vertiginous kaleidoscope of errors. I reside in a fear that traps me. It is unforgiving. Unrelenting. And so I chase respite, anything to keep the numbing terror at bay. I sing, I sweat, dance to the beat of the drums, drink, weep, stare danger in the eye. I also surround myself with strangers and delve into the depths of friendships. Too much. Too soon. I crave discovery, new, safe touch. I want to be discovered, understood.

 

I should know better.

Still, the one consistency – I need to be needed. Without a target to aim for, in the service of others, I doubt myself. Isn’t that the only way I know I’m alive?

Meanwhile, in another universe –

Pretty, curly, shy girl in the sun. Always a glass in hand, too ready to drink, forget. Pretty girl who’s too kind, too soft, yet oh so strong. Pretty girl in the eye of the storm. Chaos all around, she drags her pain, chained to her feet. Yet she’s a fighter. Pretty girl packs a punch, isn’t afraid to bite. She just wishes she didn’t self-harm, and destroyed the bad guys instead. Pretty girl wishes she were rocked to sleep, held tight and kept warm at all times. Could you read her mind? If so, she wants you on her team. Exchanging of looks, silent vibrations, communication is key. Curly girl wants to be understood. Never to disappear is all she asks.

 

Pretty, curly girl needs to rest. But will she wake? Or let another take her place, another universe, another pretty girl?

I don’t do fiction. So I write other mes.

Advertisement

Never again – hospital

What a strange, warped world, where knowing better is just not the way. Being stupid and slow will save you, being sharp and aware just damn you. Whatever protocols keep these walls standing are built from absurdities and flimsy “certitudes”. Where is the wholsesome place we need? We bruised souls unfit for combat. They herd us in, lock the gate and think we’ll heal. Now why do they believe that cut off from life is how to deal? These brutish beds, yellow walls, airless windows…is that the answer? Rather than my cocoon, painstakingly built, feather by feather, plush by plush. That’s where I need to be.

The whole world

Is on its head

Pupils taking care

Of teachers’ kids

The sick taking care

Of the young and free

 

To keep me from the lake

Is cruel torture.

To see it glisten from afar

Watch its waves beckon,

Waver in the weak winter sun

Is it necessary?

 

Leaving me to sing songs

Behind fast glass

Is making my soul weary.