pills like soap and water
There is great safety in pretending, but greater power in being.
The doctor says to up the dosage, but I toss the script. I don’t want to lose the memory after all.
I was curled up fetal in the middle of my living room the first time it happened. My friends brought me coke and stories, pressed me to write, more music……more words. I learned things from powder 101. The words, legion in their numbers, befriended me like the vultures at my door. Perfect they said, mahogany skin over tight ballooning muscle, an intellect they said. Fully medicated, there were conversations about the truths behind the 5 points and their defense budget. They would spring forward saying, talented with 8 fingers, talented with voice and finger…..pen and inflection, their words my pain.
I threw all of her away for a walk to high street. Throwing all that away for just one more……no betrayal from heart, or member, but many from mind.
The doctor says I must hold on to myself, I must grasp firmer and let water mix with me, mix with my ash, and force air from sediment for concrete foundation.
8 months ago, turns to 3 years ago, revisits 1 & 1/2 year ago, I acknowledge that the first drops are always the coldest. These are the ones to shy from. It is what is natural in nature that I found unnatural to shy from. Back there on Wild Young Indigo, the talents would not survive the torment. The torment would outlive the efforts. The texture I remember, drowned every available molecule. It was always and will always be the river of all grown up suffering……..it is that suffering, that frees every available nerve ending, frees the mind and makes room for tomorrow. It frees the soul to travel without baggage.
The doctor tells me that what remains here, is what must be. this is clinical speak for, what must be, is what remains.
The emotional sleeve left behind is torn and too small to fit. I took a day off to hand it in and walk away from the hum and whistle of that time clock. Time and being has become being on time again. My time, my being.
When I arrive she is quiet, her hands the cradle of warmth. Her ankles are crossed, toes curled under. I watch them like a sporting event, her visiting team of five international tonalities. I watch them like a film. They have tales of inner evolutions torrential in their passing, like clouds bursting or moisture in fire wood. When she passes me the tea there’s an inside line my hand traces on hers, her outside line traced. Hands that would hold me, now pull warmth from green and white teas. Her silence mimics a smile, and reminds me, for the most part, that it is not yet summer. I unbutton my coat in response.
The doctor demands that I open myself, like a gift, tearing the wrapping becoming limitless, spilling myself to breathe. This is metaphor for feeling safe, locked under ice, while all the sea is on fire. My ribbons won’t cut.
I tell the scientist that the slightest bark from doves in that tree foster a hardness. Hardness like young unripe apples, with tight wrinkled flower buds. I whisper to them so they are eager to be pollinated and revered.
Therapy starts with towels heated, then friction from rubbing and erasing. I remember clearly, wet skin, wet hair, and the eraser. I was warned repeatedly, these towels are here to tie down desires. These towels are here to bind tired hands in prayer and cleanliness.
While she is not watching I steal glimpses of her hands as they tap maple for sap, and table top for emphasis. Smooth as milk, I am watching eyes for hints of violet and green, browns and when she is laughing I am
catching hints of skirt inched up, revealing this bathed in eyelash darkness in the light of her being.
The door clicks shuts behind me, where the street looms outward beyond the trees. I text her that I am willing to walk over large bodies of water, her response is a 3 syllable sigh that I mistake for boredom, it is pleasure and the letters linger there italicized.
When I arrive we are sculpting with eyes closed, thigh to hip, pressed in to sculpt. It is true that we were connected before this pressing, connected now through it. The conversation was drawn out, outward from perfectly drawn eyes, nose and the ring is cool against my cheek.
I am taking inventory of her hair and skin. I am bathed to gold by the rich tones in her thick deep waters. Every once and a while a look can say more than words simply trapped in mind and relayed to tongue. Every once and a while a look is the word cut from heart spent exhaustion.
The doctor tells me the first step to wean you off medication is to wait for your shame filled declaration, your guilt soaked admission. There is no longer safety in juniper and lime.
Her reach for my hand lingers on wrist. She holds it there as she tells me about intelligence and the rocks turned to find it. I am careful not to kiss her. I am so careful not to do, what her eyes tell me to do, that way, they will trust me again and again, to do the things……. I want to do.
When we are alone she tell me, “ I am a collector of shape and space”. she does not yet know that I commit her many surprises to memory. I pull those images easier than selecting the soft fabric I wore to capture her attention. Fingers linger on fingers leaving the fine dust of respect.
I have stayed one more winter than intended. In that time I may have run a bath, prepared orzo and steamed broccoli, yet I did not.. I’m ahead of myself still holding the kiss, still ahead of myself fixing the seal around the leak, still ahead of myself, strumming the sand as it runs through my hands. The doctor no longer speaks of medication and forgetting, I am granted a release and I am driving right over him onto that road to a star lit morning.
