ShardsAndPieces

jack has his roots deep, or maybe wide. he knows where he comes from and he knows he is loved deep in the hearts of many people. he knows that his grandmother taught him herblore and that his family history spans seven sons and more. he knows all this, and he chooses to grow further – not because he does not love them back, but because he is finding what he loves himself. 

grey knows he is loved, but he knows there has always been a “but” hanging over the end of that sentence. he knows that love is hot chocolate and warmth on mountain nights, but he also knows his sister’s love has always come from fear. he walks away. he chooses when he grieves. he finds something that he dives deeply into, and then he finds people who will drag him outside of it sometimes.

rupert’s whole history is so deep it’s not rooted, but written. he carries four names and seven men. his mother’s love is in excellent wading boots and not in a sack of potatoes. he digs his fingers deep into his heritage, learns it front to back and back to front from primary sources, puts a badge on his chests and decides a hero can fight in alleys and file papers too. he is so, so loved, and he loves back. he takes what his family’s built and climbs up to reach even higher. he tugs his family tree in a new direction, gently, with grafting wire.

-

“Right Back With Coffee” 

by Shanna Alden

I have spent most of my life as a writer, 

spinning universes and microscope lenses,

cosmic horrors, and hope.

Intellectual treatise, statistical research, and internet rant.

but despite this,

and despite months of trying,

I am shit at writing love poems.

And you, 

you deserve love poems

but convention and tradition offer me no council

I mean, 

I could promise pull down the moon for you, 

and I’m sure you’d be impressed by my scientific prowess 

as I tear chapters from your favorite science fiction 

to build the world’s first tractor beam…

But the minute I turn that thing on, 

oceans will pull back from distant shores 

and rush towards our coastal town 

killing hundreds of our friends 

and thousands of innocent fish somewhere in the vicinity of Tahiti, 

and I just don’t think expressing love with the mass murder of people 

…and fish 

makes a whole lot of sense.

You can call me unromantic, 

but no matter how fond of you I am, 

I just don’t think any one person is worth an extinction level event.

I could tell you that your soulful, eyes shine like the sun, 

that you are like staring at the sun,

But, one of the myriad reasons I love you

is that unlike some other loves, 

in some other poems,

you are not out to blind me. 

…and unlike the sun, 

you don’t give me skin cancer.

I am suspicious that

celestial metaphors secretly suck.

Maybe I’m being too literal, 

but I feel like comparing our love to silent, 

deadly titans, suspended in cold unknowable expanse, is like saying

we will always be so distant, we will only really see each other 

in the reflections of our past.  

I want better for us,

words that don’t imply 

emotions have rendered us scientifically illiterate sociopaths.

After hours and months, the best I’ve been able to come up with is this: 

I’ll be right back, with coffee.

No, seriously,

I think these might be 

The Most Romantic Words. 

…Hear me out.

When I say, I’ll be right back with coffee

I mean I will face blindness, 

from the actual sun, 

at whiskey hangover o’clock,

so you can sleep a little longer.

I mean I want your mind to function at full capacity

because while, yes, you are inarguably beautiful,

I’m very much like a zombie

in that I am really into you for your brains.

It means, I want to give you comfort

and as proper Seattleites 

our comfort curls steaming

from mugs clutched between fingers

and tongues tempered to know 

a little bitterness enhances warmth.

When I say, “I’ll be right back with coffee”,

I mean you’ve known me to leave,

And I have known you to leave,

and we’ve seen each other run

both away from and toward dangerous things

…like each other

and while we may put cold unknowable distance between us, 

if I can provide warmth, or comfort, or a few minutes of peace

rest assured,

even if I have to go for a while,

My knee jerk response when asked this, even if it’s by a companionable dude old enough to be my dad, is to go, “uh, nah-” and then ramble uncomfortably until someone stops me-

-which is what I started to do, only to be cut off by Contractor saying, in an embarrassed rush, “some of the guys were asking me because you and I talk sometimes, but I didn’t want them to hit on you at work, so I told them that you Worship the Devil and would Hex them if they tried. I’m sorry.”

Which leaves me wheezing helplessly, trying to get my shit together, because this is honestly one of the nicest, most hysterical things I’ve ever heard someone say to me.

Oblivious to this, Contractor then follows up with, “and they were like ‘forreal??’ so I was like, ‘yeah, she’s probably a sadist, too, you can tell by her jewelry. She’ll stab you or something.’”

And tbh I can’t even come up with anything witty to say in response, so all I manage to choke out is, “pleASE LET THEM CONTINUE TO THINK THAT, I’M BEGGING YOU.”

And Contractor just smiles and is like, “Okay! I just wanted to let you know!” before driving off with his forklift.