In another month I might have a mouth that you would look to for words. That is not what’s happening now. We rotate around the same history, but our limbs were different and so were our scars. This is how it looks to us. This is how it looks to me. A hand on the door always. It’s where the light gets in. In the dark, the porch light. And it only goes so far as the snow, which is coming down thickly in the not now. The sometimes I could see me. When I saw your hand there on the door and the cold came in.
A woman sits in a reserved wooden chair, talking about her father. In a fold-out chair I become him. She says what she says and I say yes. I stand and am him, hands folded behind my back, my socked feet warm on the floorboards. Sound of traffic coming in. Slowdown at the near light. Despite the heat, the windows closed. I stand and am him. Two women stand behind me, two men. One calm, one noosed and red in the eyes. It isn’t him. It isn’t. I hand a pillow off. This is my loneliness. This is his loneliness. This is hers. I call it grief, and it starts like this.
What is the difference between loneliness and grief? A belief that change is possible.
What is the difference between my warm hands and her heart? There are two of me, one to keep and one to give away.
When did the light in the room go out and how many times? Every time she looked at me.
In another mouth I might have a month of words. But now, the stillness. But now, sometimes the cycling through.
At the fruit stand a man clips a shade to the underside of awning as late afternoon comes on. The sidewalk is black in spots and a man drops a pear. Wet mark on the sidewalk, slug trail of sweet pushes under the table. I see you, I say. Inside my head. And he does look up, but I look away. Is how in coming days the white will darken. A woman checks her phone for some sign. It is clear she does not get it. In this country my phone stops working. A gift, I say. I come here often. A woman stalls her hand over the peaches and pulls it away.
A woman sits in a reserved chair talking about a decision that’s not hers to make. I’ve been here before, I want to say. It’s unclear whether I’m here now, I also say. And I think about that as two women talk quietly. Her hair is pulled back and she loves her mother country. Her arms are strong. She wants to be here, but no one believes her. The dark eyes of the man behind me find their kindness and spread it around the room. In the circle motion a closeness, but no one knows quite to what. A third option. All week the talk of third eyes, I think. And I look to the mountains crowning outside the window.
In another month, I will know what to do with my sadness. Infuse it with light, reminding how productive it has been. Or turn it off and look away. Just for a minute.
Where did the light change? It came in through the skylight, but nobody wanted it, so it left through the door.
What is the difference between licorice and drought? An empty box and a heartache, the smell of anise on her hands.
When did the light change? Only when the car went through. It was effect and cause, not how it’s supposed to be.
A woman sits on a leather sofa. She doesn’t believe in this. Her face is shining in the swelter. I wonder about mine in the heat. It’s my face and I can’t see it. It’s mine and I can’t. There must be a metaphor in here. Her hair pulled back in a bun, tight and dark blonde. She’s shorter than me. When she stands I can see the outline of her legs through her dress. Everyone backlit in the western exposure of the sun porch. But we are here in the light. The candle begins to pour out of it’s column, pens an idea across and down the wood of the table. In neat lines. It has decided to go with the grain.
The waitress doesn’t want me here. I’ve come in with minutes to spare. In the month of July I make 31 promises to myself. This one is about lunch, so I stay. I order the bento box with the eel over rice and dynamite roll, salad and miso. Thank you, I say. I’m sorry is what I mean. I open my book and I underline things that might mean something to me later.
How did we arrive at this place? With the windows open the street sounds come in. What did we do when the light turned off? You had your eyes closed and thought I had done it. What’s the difference between blame and responsibility? I was standing right next to you, under the shower. It’s been 42 days and the sun still goes down in the same place and the sun still comes up.
In another month, I will know what to do with my sadness. Infuse it with light, reminding how productive it has been. Or turn it off and look away. Just for a minute.
In the paper, another new fire. Another pet store burns down in my town. And as everyone else does, I wonder about the fish in their square boxes of glass. The warmth of the glare. And we are in here. The lights stay off for 24 hours. We cook eggs on the wood stove. We read by the firelight. We walk in the snow. A woman sits on a hard wooden chair, talking about her brother who died in the womb. I have a story like this. She thinks I’m her father. But he’s wearing a dress and is delighted to be here, hooking his arm around the arms of the woman who is standing taller with her soul and leans back into the shadow of the late late afternoon light. It was like this once, I thought. A father holds his daughter. What can this mean for me? I wasn’t the first daughter. Was I meant to be her? A mother couldn’t hold her daughter and so she didn’t hold her daughter. A mother behind the wheel of a car without seatbelts. The first punch, I think, was the wheel into me. What can it mean? The woman on the hard wooden chair doesn’t want to come back to her mother, that’s not where the wound is, she says, that she wants to close. But in the end she does. There’s an embrace and everyone sweats at the center. I hold a piece of chocolate in my hand and wait for no one looking at me before I place it in my mouth. It is a circle, so this takes some time. There is a sticky chalkiness to a hand of melted chocolate. Later I will buy a loaf of bread and the girl behind the counter will tell me she loves me because I don’t want it sliced. I will walk into the street with tears in my eyes. How did we arrive at this place? The light came in and in and in. And we couldn’t see anything, but we could see enough. What’s the difference between grief and loneliness? The wracking in the chest immobilizes the arms at one’s sides and the birdsongs sound clearer than before. And the light? It keeps coming in. Stand here with me.
EJ Colen is the author of What Weaponry, a novel in prose poems, poetry collections Money for Sunsets (Lambda Literary Award finalist in 2011) and Waiting Up for the End of the World: Conspiracies, flash fiction collection Dear Mother Monster, Dear Daughter Mistake, long poem / lyric essay hybrid The Green Condition, fiction collaboration Your Sick, and fiction collaboration True Ash. Nonfiction editor at Tupelo Press and freelance editor/manuscript consultant, she teaches at Western Washington University.