Iron Writings

I used to dream about our other chances, grains we never ate. The orange of your mind  in this space           where I am at. We meet in various iterations you the fly and me the worm you the acorn, spring, me when the ground grows red and we meet to talk about little things.         My body is hard to navigate, easier for some than others        cilia on legs, arms, to feel what isn’t there. To lie in bed and not talk is both the best and worst thing.          It is grainy it is wood stuck to a tongue.            It is cream gone cold it is a child’s song I can’t make heads or tails of.         What are you thinking I won’t say because            I used to dream the best iteration of us         one hand spread  the storm between its fingers.

            Catch, you might say. I flex my hands

            My father woke me in the small hours of night, shuffled my brother and I towards the backseat of his car and just went. We didn’t know where he was taking us but didn’t want to ask. The streets were slicked with rain, traffic lights blurred and blinking, but there was no one else to pass. He barely slowed at each intersection and neither my brother nor I cried in the backseat. Living room far back home, though not so far it was easy to forget. A woman lay dead under her framed painting of Venice beneath the gondolas anchored with no men to row them, and the canals so blue they seemed safe to swim. Of course, they were not safe to swim and people died all the time, especially of cancer, especially in their living rooms under Venetian seascapes.

            It was more difficult if I thought of who this woman had been when she was breathing, my mother, and so instead I leaned from the backseat window, rain on my outstretched hand, and my father up front with no one next to him on the passenger side. In real life, he had hated sitting up front alone, always chastised us kids when we tried to pull one over on him, sitting with our friends instead of him when he drove. “I’m not your chauffeur,” he’d say.

            The woman in the living room had been sick for a very long time. After work as a counselor at an art camp, I’d come visit her with sandwiches. There was never anything much to say. I’d sit by her with my plate poised over her bedside table, florescent lights overhead like too bright stars, a sign they would soon be dying out, as all stars do. I’d sit and I wouldn’t bring anything to do. If she had a headache and couldn’t read, I had a headache and couldn’t read. It didn’t seem fair to flaunt books she’d never finish, knew she’d never finish, in front of her, when I was supposed to be making meaningful conversation.

We walk to the graveyard on a sunny day the grounds by my house, Calvalry. I think of men stately atop equine equals wish I had a horse to feed apples, stable in Queens between the Guatemalan churches and bakeries. I just push a bike instead. Sopronos filmed years ahead before the deaths go again anytime you turn on the television.

We are at the graveyard on a holiday the sun is hot steams the wind as we walk Stones are names stuck to granite like granite sticks to time. A tree would be better; I shouldn’t judge another’s death but don’t spread the ashes just yet

We are at the graveyard on a holiday my mother’s birthday, past tense I still mouth the verbs capped. In my dream, she hasn’t left but when I do, she never said debate the stones so I never did.

We, at the graveyard with a bike death for us, Soprono style, a bush and a plaque for the Baritone man. On my way from Calvalry, I fall they moved the Baritone from Manhattan to Queens dug his body and it sings The scrapes on my knees are roses I kneel at the stone and rest them there. My mother’s birthday is another day,

as I previously mentioned, literary magazine and online community, The Whale, will be going live on July 1st. We’d like to have submissions ready and edited for opening day. I would love to read whatever you’ve got! Email submissions to: [email protected]

and check out the submission page for guidelines:

One of the reasons why I have been MIA on tumblr (& therefore in life) is because I’ve been working on an exciting literary project with a dear friend of mine. We have been tirelessly interviewing up-and-coming writers, accomplished authors, booty-banging musicians, and youtube-famous weirdos for our debut.

I will be writing a piece of flash fiction every Sunday before and after our launch.

I know you’ve seen thousands of new literary blogs. I know you’re tired of them. But this one may be worth it. It seeks to fill the disconnects our dear internet leaves with its disparate, unfocused, manic nature. It seeks to create a community of those who need to communicate.

I know from experience there are some amazing writers out there on tumblr and I call all of you to submit to THE WHALE. I will be one of the editors and would love to read, edit, and publish your finished work.

The Whale will launch July 1st 2015 and I hope to see you all there.

http://thewhalesings.com

https://www.facebook.com/thewhalesings/info?tab=page_info

Sly projection Mud fall slow but I laughed; you ever seen the sky that color? Couldn’t say.

Puppeteer and his gallows. Grassy hill and mess of horses. Your face peaks through.

The lake had been cleansing. Callum could remember his father leading him there by the hand, falling ahead. Michael’s body was so large it blocked the set of sun, the rays eking over his silhouette like a disorganized halo. Callum’s mind was full and blurred and he only saw things passing as his father dragged him. He found himself unable to pull the dulled purples and oranges of the sunset into something complete. But he felt safe. He felt understood with his hand nestled thickly in his father’s. He brimmed with the understanding he no longer had to lead; Michael would take care of everything from here on out. His shirt and face and limbs were sticky with the call and response of the shot, but his father would wash it away.

            When they arrived, the mouth of water spitting against land, Michael turned to his son so they both stopped short, “Take off your clothes,” he said, his face fading to black as the sun fell from the sky. Callum’s back dead white in the dim light. He let his pants drop to his ankles and crouched at the edge of the water. His father helped him up and guided him into the water, black pooling and leering at Callum’s calves. His father, also naked, faded into the darkness of the night air as he cupped water in the cradle of his hand and pulled it, gentle, over his son’s head.

            “What will we do with the body?” Callum asked as his father eased water along the midline of his back.

            “Don’t worry. It’s taken care of,” His father said, his fingers threading through Callum’s hair, combing quick to rid it of sand and viscera nestled in the roots. “You will be okay.” The water cooled his back. Callum believed this statement unequivocally.

            His father’s voice was silver in the water, “You are perfect,” he said, scooping water over the black of his son’s head. “You are good.”

I water my feet without cloth, returning to the Hudson on a lake where the mother insists her daughter swim. Topless, the daughter wades in, turning to her love while the mud piles up and it’s like the red sea. Remembering her own fearlessness, she dives, but refuses to wet her own hair, curls coming undone.

 When I was small, my mother used to sing out the windows of cars, and I would sink until only the top of my head could be seen. No one should know until she ended her song. It was so beautiful even when it wasn’t— the voice sung travels farther than spoken, but

I   didn’t care, just wanted her to finish, quick trees passing. She spread mud over. Her face like the red sea.

Don’t believe my mother is buried under yet I know this as truth. The bit of dirt shoveled over, dead sea mud over her face in the mountains. And the girl in the river could be me, breasts bared between lover and mother, curls undone. Ashamed when her mother smears the mud like war paint.

I run the bath. Without cold, I’m complacent. Taxonomy of touch; The water laps woolen.

Not since I was seven, the woman who watched would lift me up, my heat withered. She’d braid me in plaits. Taxonomy of hair; The young loom.

Egg sandwich waiting. The yolk leaks. At seven, I don’t know; It could never have been born. Taxonomy of belief; It could have been born.

Since I was seven, I hadn’t bathed. I showered; my searing state. No more woman who watches. I must watch myself.

I pour wool over the children’s heads. I lift them and they cry. Air too skinny I tell them eggs aren’t babies. I feed them and they cry. Babies is melted hide their eyes; remove the yolks.

Without water, complacency. Since age seven, I watched the spray. I eat eggs despite the child, allow hair to tangle without its plaits.

Reject the sweet geometry of knees and fists naked in cold arrival.

She played with her hair but the audience wasn’t her equal in voice or breadth.

 Here, the arrival of a woman born perpetually.