Dense
(heavy, weighted, full of substance
and dumb).
Oh, yes--you
can be dense, darling,
forgetting to feed me
forgetting to feed me.
(did you forget me?)
But somehow you always
catch up
to find me frantic, nearly
falling from
fingertip-gripped fences
fighting for
furious for
feeling anything
anything that
ANYTHING that might
make that warm, comfortably
dense lock and chain around my neck
tighten
to tell all the world
I am not my own.
Dense.
I need to feel freely
weighted
but with room
to burn
to sing
when I feel like falling
or stay
with my everything
shaking
(everything is shaking)
bursting out the
seams like
EVERYTHING IS SHAKING
but you push
my face hard against your chest
dense
solid
shake-resistant.
I am not my own.
Dense.
All those yards of fabric
I brought, to stitch
a prettier picture (for you
of me)
that I forgot
(did I forget you?)
you didn't need
to see
to see me,
lay rumpledwrinkledchaotic
on your bed
room floor.
Placing them
perfectly rolled and
perpetually unorganized,
no matter my intentions,
back into my massive suitcase
(all that baggage
laid open
on your bed--I'm sorry
I'm so sorry for the mess, love, but I promise
I'm so sorry
I'm leaving soon)
while I swear
I swear
I SWEAR I CAN FEEL
...i can feel
every movement you make
while you digitally inscribe
our scattered soundtracks
behind me; now
etched permanently, those
melodies and harmonies we've sung so hard
pushing to twist
together
between car windows and carcinogen-filled
exhalations after laughs before questions punctuated by barely bruising
pokes, prods, and punching
hand
grasps.
Dense.
I am not my own.
I tried to breathe
your every movement;
your hands
Oh
your hands
pushing beats into the air
twisting inflections of heavily blasted muses
and playing across my bones
like there might be music
there, too
is a turbulent grace
etched into your bones,
a quiet acceptance
a screaming exultation
with heart and face lifted
that we are not our own.
Dense.
All those last shuddering inhalations I should have
spent shared with you,
not wide-eyed, fixated ahead, pushing onward
a proper little girl in a security line
ignoring
(STOP LETTING ME IGNORE)
that heavy burn at the bottom of my throat.
I should have broken
your ribs against the terminal walls
and left you burning with each breath
to show you with
lips between teeth
that more than one week
(was it only one week?)
(why was it only one week?)
was fucked up
by the joining of
like
burning
different
echoes
bellowing from below
those finger-width
spaces
between
ribs.
We are not our own.
