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They tell me to be at peace.
They don’t notice that I am in pieces. Regardless of the blood that drips from my lips. Regardless of the bruises that shackle my wrists. They wrestle control from bloodied fingers, and crack my knees against the floor. They wish to strip me of my strength, and trap me in my voice. They wish for me to cease, gagging me with dirtied money. They think it will stop me, stuffed mouth unable to speak. Her shoes were made in the year 1977. They belonged to her grandmother when she was
a young woman. They were wingtip derby dress shoes in a size 8-and-a-half with a very slight heel. She’d been granted permission to wear them to work after filing a special request with her employer. She’d made a very thorough case for the shoes. They were in beautiful shape, closed-toed, and sturdy. They’d made her bring them in to prove that she could sprint down the hallway in them. The shoes were made from alligator skin, her favorite animal, said to still roam free in the half-drowned Atlantis that remained of the Southeastern American wilds, where her extended family had once lived, just outside of Miami – what the shoes lacked in utility, they made up for in history. Tip-tack-tip-tack, the shoes used to go, smacking tiles as she walked back and forth across her grandad’s deck like America’s Next Top Model. Now they made almost no sound at all, just a faint thup-thup-thup. Principal Ndongo’s allowance of the shoes hinged on the condition that they be appropriately dampened – several spaces in the facility still had hard, lacquered floor, namely the cafeteria and gym areas. She paced around the empty facility, poking her head into all the rooms that would be, any time now, full of human beings. During her extensive training, she’d participated in several full-occupancy armed safety drills, but those always struck her as falsely urgent, bordering on ridiculous. They were meant to further complicate an already fabricated scenario, like trying to catch someone off-guard while playing Simon Says. Simon Says get the fuck down, now, now, now. I find redemption in the contours of your back
Weighing heavy on the breadth of your shoulders A map to vengeance, peace, freedom written in the notches of your spine Each freckle I come across a landmark, a victory I find hope in your hands Sprinkled throughout the callouses A warm cradle for actions, consequences, victory Found in the cup of your palms Each finger slots into mine A safety net, a promise Pass the salt. Say grace at the dinner table. Say this could be something.
We eat quietly by the window under sunbeams, listening to the music of a songbird’s serenade. I can’t remember the last time we had a meal like this, together and yet still so alone. If you could speak to me for the first time, what would you say? Do you want to light the candles? I ask, and you shake your head. They’re just there for decoration. Of course they are. The food is stale. Still, I eat because you have made it. This cooking, though unappetizing, is one of the purest forms of love. I will not turn it into one of shame. When we finish, I notice the chipped edge of your plate. Even in this silence we share it screams, I am here. I am lived in. A smile spreads across my lips, thin and wry. Today has been good to us. Neither do I belong to those fetters of fragility
furled around my feet, nor do I belong to the shallowly strength depicted by utter superficiality; I am the daughter of clay, and of callosity, crafted with the competence of being fragile and fortitudinous all at once. Getting mascara on your eyelid.
Smudging your nail polish because it takes too long to dry. Not knowing how to receive compliments. Knowing how to give them. Allowing yourself to be girly in a way that isn’t ironic or making fun. Allowing yourself to not be girly, not just to be different. |