Notes on the Other Side of Silence

One.
Someday you’ll wake up and realize
you haven’t been sleeping
Her morning breath whispered in my ear half asleep
half a bottle of wine still sloshing in my eardrums
Last night we ate guacamole out of a tortilla boat
and talked about other coasts
I said I’ve been afraid of flying lately
Afraid of the sky sucking me back up
into where I came from
And she says that’s completely ridiculous Sarah-
You come from the earth dammit
And I believe her
This is the only thing that’s made sense to me in 93 days.

Two.
When I try to see into tomorrow
the only postcard I get back is a wall
So he asks me to tell him what my bricks are made of
I don’t know I say
he says TRY
and I say I don’t know
and he says TRY
and I say one
is for the visionary that lives under the bridge in my lungs
Two is for the day I wake up inflated with your prologue
Three is for the voiceless, broken, can’t make sense
of why this is important
Four is for the fear that the bricks are always present
and that God is not inside these clouds
Five is the clouds, beating chaos into my mornings
Six is that broken girls don’t make good lovers
Seven is that I will never fly again, never love the sky again
never hold the hand and feel that I
deserve that warmth again,
I fear that I may never look at my reflection
in the mirror or the clouds or your eyeball
and know that is me again.
I feel that I may never feel like me again.

And it’s funny, really, his silence
Im waiting for him to pull me close, closer and whisper
“Baby, Lets deconstruct this Babylon together”

Three.
The bombshell in front of me at the Post Office
is wearing Seven Jeans
For Man-fucking-kind I think
Her painted toes remind me how pathetic I am, I think
She puts her padded manila envelope on the desk
smothered in hearts and kisses
And asks them how quickly a first class package
can arrive in Iraq

Nobody really has all their shit together.

FREE mothertongue show 8/19 @ Black Cat @ 8PM

It's August, it's hot and mothertongue is going recession friendly for their summer show. Come support DC's women's spoken word group at the Black Cat on Wednesday August 19th at 8pm. The show is FREE, Jenny C. Lares is featuring, there is an open mic open to all and donations ($5 suggested) benefit WIN (Women's Information Network).

For more information on the show, check out the facebook invite.

What happens when you ask your waiter for a prompt

Gowri K and I met for a long overdue Sunday afternoon at Tryst today. With no inspiration of our own brewing,  we asked our waiter for a jumping off point. Turns out, he had almost died on his drive to Adam's Morgan from Virginia. So here goes "I almost died." Also much thanks to the wonderful bartenders we sat next to who bought us shots of Blue Curacao (?). Random but tasty.

I almost died this morning

Twice

The first time I got lost in the soundtrack of your 

breath as we slept. 

You whispering in my ear with each

dip in your dreaming. 

I forgot what my breath tasted like. 

Forgot that the nutrition of your touch, your limbs

Felt essential as hearts beating, breaking. 

I wanted to forget about that rhythm and try 

your lungs instead 

But morning reminded me of time, rhythms. 

I knew we'd eventually rise to burnt toast and crosswords

And the moment on the stoop when I want to grab you 

and run away to under the covers. 

See I almost died today.

Twice.

I arose and went back to sleep.

But in those moments before consciousness

before the day's hissing latte machine or somber music,

with your breath playing that hymnal in my ear,

briefly before daylight stole you away

I lived. 

Like A Wave

Like a wave, when they came, they came like a wave

Like the ocean floor rolling sunken treasures

over their skin and in and out of their

salted fingernails

They came like winter

Too soon to get used to cold current

ripping through icicle lungs

They came like a wave

Two by two and in every variety

There were miracles then

Etched in the sand and coral-

the stories of floating fisherman boots

and lost caverns.

They came like the blazing sun on beaches

Fading everything in the path of its glow

They came like a wave

I hope you glow like that

They came like a wave

Don't forget their candle flickered underwater

and warned us of trespassers

Of bottom-feeders looking for some oxygen.

I pray for the wave to roll over your tentacles

and give you peace

The sky cannot haunt you here.

They came like a wave

With tides like lullabies

to rock them back to slumber.

When they came

They floated to shore with the afternoon

Slept naked on the beach with sand and starfish

When they came, they came like a wave.