Writers Jam

as i sat on the bench at Riverside Park, separated from the banks of Huron by a mere foot of grass, everything felt so alive in the most surreal way. the shape of a squirrel & her restless tail, hovering by the garbage cans looking for morsels of food with her name on them. in the background, i can hear the phone call - the bois discussing NFC & the stock market & cricket & things that the bois discuss. yet each of their voices was laced with the distinct sound of each of their stories, layers so deep it is a Herculean endeavor to try to look from the outside in. the bluejays, however, could not be bothered under the glowing sun & cool breeze. they echoed messages that ricocheted off the ripples on the water’s skin, communicating in their own code stories of love, death, grief, separation, rebirth. the wind caressed my face like a lover’s feathery touch. the sound of cicadas intertwined itself with the river’s voice. the drum beat of the pendant i found at the farmer’s market knocking against my chest. encased in masterfully manipulated wiring, the stone-carved female anatomy. how fucking Venusian. what stone? i do not recall. what i do recall is the story the man who sold it to me had to tell. the story of his mother - or was it grandmother? - & how she loved to collect gemstones, crystals & trinkets, & how after her passing, he & his own children had begun to wire & make jewelry out of them. he had the most magnificent aura, & how much it felt like the Sun. how it made my skin crawl to somehow know that this man knew grief all too well. for a brief moment, our faces turned into mirrors. our smiles, were they bare or trying to shroud what our hearts had silently endured? this is adornment. do you see? the smile is a seal on the words that i hid under my own tongue. the rose gold perched on my collarbones is no less than a talisman, a relic of the ones who came before me. where are the ancestors? the snake & the octopus wrap themselves around my fingers, & two fierce lions devour each other around the curvature of my wrist. i blew kisses at the moon the other night & she called me a slut. i said okay, as long as i can be your slut. she smiled. the black embroidered into my kaala kurta & the black smeared along the cliff edges of my waterline are holy protest. did you know your voice has texture & color & weight & taste & feel & flow? the red rubies dangling from my ears? the scarlet in their reflection is a tale of spilled blood, in service to the holy. the womb is where every warrior comes from. the dirt is where every sage rests. the monarchs undertake a pilgrimage that takes four generations to complete. are we any different? each one, a link in the chain of events necessary & critical to part of the journey. flowers are sensual beings — sirens to the honeybees. pollen smears their dazed faces, like the blood of pomegranates dripping down my chin, draping itself around my neck & pressing into my sternum. the eyes, they glow a blinding golden, incapable of containing the infernal rage & love that ravage the terrain of this soul. should i let the monster out so he can feast on other monsters? what haunts your heart my darling? what scars are you hiding beloved? what hurts too much to touch sweet one?