rib of a dog
A few months after His death
I had a terrible, terrible nightmare
That when they took my Dog away
(After they had stuffed Him in the freezer to dry)
They performed the cremation,
But not before they took His cold, hard body,
Sliced it open
And stole a rib.
In the glimmer of my dream
I asked my Mother for the ashes
(She had already scattered them)
And instead, she presented me with the bone
Casually,
As if she were handing me a cup of coffee.
I cried that night in my sleep,
And I cried to my Mother,
Her face blurred in the chill of my dream.
“Why have you given this to me?” I wailed and wailed,
“I don’t want this!”
I don’t want this.
“Take it back to Him.”
He needs it.
“But what of the hair that you cut from His head?”
She asked me,
“Won’t He need that?”
As I held the smooth bone in my hands,
The neatness and lightness of it struck me.
It felt like my heartbeat,
It felt like His breath,
It felt like a theatre prop,
And not the rib of a dog.
the tower
In another dream:
I was a beautiful young princess.
My hair was long and slippery,
Waves of fabric drifted down my shoulders and hips
And my head felt light
Without the weight of a crown.
I was stranded
Atop a very tall tower,
Locked away by an unknown force,
With the raging seas below me
My only escape.
Atop this very tall tower,
The wind pushed against the stone
And I swayed with it
How thin its structure was,
How horrific its design.
I was told in a vision,
By a woman who felt like my mother
(yet her eyes were far too foreign),
Or like my captor
(yet her hands were far too soft in mine),
That if I were to throw myself into the waters,
If I were to allow the foam to enter my lungs and eyes,
I would be rescued by a knight of the sea
And taken into the care of a faraway kingdom,
Where I would wed it’s prince
And live happily ever after.
In this vision she also warned me,
This was merely one possibility out of many
That could come from tossing myself into the screaming abyss.
However, I had few options
My only company at the top of that tower
Was boredom and doom
For erosion would eat at the base of the stone,
And the wind would shatter its spine,
And regardless I would eventually belong to the murky deep.
You see,
The prospect of eternal happiness and warmth,
The possibility of standing on stationary ground
After swaying in the sky for so long,
Was too great to ignore.
So I stepped off the tower.
I gave myself to the wind,
Which lifted my hair in its hands,
Pulled tightly at my gown,
And handed me over to the sea.
I drowned.
The salt scratched at my princess lungs,
My princess eyes.
My princess hands were claimed by sharks.
And yet I awoke,
Not in my bed,
But still inside my dream,
Staggering at the top of that tower.
Again and again I threw myself from that stone pillar
Once a sailor saved me,
Raped me,
And gave me back to the sea.
Once a band of pirates took me aboard,
Gave me a new name,
A new face,
And allowed me to rob and fuck alongside them,
Until I grew old and my legs were claimed by leprosy.
Once,
And only once,
I was rescued by the Royal Navy,
Pulled from the water by my hair,
Shaking and clawing at my own eyes,
Skin peeling in salty layers.
Stripped naked and given the finest of garments,
And presented in front of a young prince
Who saw beauty in my bluish tinge,
My wrinkled fingertips,
And took my hand in marriage.
He gave me a wedding,
A throne,
Children,
Until we grew old and died hating our spawn
For wearing our crowns
And counting our money
As we took our last breaths.
All of these endings,
All with the same beginning:
Stood atop that trembling tower,
The memories of each possibility above me,
Exodus seemingly beneath me
And in between the heavens and the sea I stand,
Head bent,
Knees weak,
Certain that no matter the outcome,
I could not continue shivering there,
Atop that tower.
the faun and my feet
A year after I last saw you
You came for me in my dreams.
You were stalking me down the corridors of my home
You held no weapon
You weren’t even chasing me
And yet I was petrified
Your scent was enough to turn my blood cold.
I hid under beds
In closets
Behind bathrooms doors
And your broken silhouette.
The grinding of your crooked spine
Followed me around my home
The sharp angles of your shadow
Stabbed at my eyes
The sound of your steps behind me
The clip-clopping of hooves
Ricocheted down the halls and around my tender head.
The light of the nightmare illuminated your soft, pale skin
The hair on your legs,
Your head
As light and fluffy as dandelions.
You laughed when you caught me,
Fuzzy chin tilted up to the ceiling
Nails digging into my hips
You above me again
And again
Freezing me in your grasp.
That small smile
Filled with small teeth
Sickly white against your bright red face
Glaring into the putty of my skull.
You pulled a wicked cleaver from your pocket
And in an instant
You brought it down on my feet.
The pain was excruciating
Sharp and fierce
(a throbbing sickness in my belly
that felt all too familiar)
The sheer force of my own hot blood
Spurting from my ankles
Held me to the floor
Pinned in place like an ant trapped in syrup.
As I tried to drag the unbearable weight of my body away
I cursed the heaviness of my skin
My bones
My breasts.
You laughed and laughed and laughed
And I understood then
That you had come back for more
That a part of me would forever belong to a part of you
And now that you had stolen my feet
I couldn’t escape you anymore.
I couldn’t run.