Lani looks for love in all the wrong places. Only she doesn't know until after that the places were wrong. A
twenty something self-proclaimed girly-girl, Lani is prone to being easily swept off her feet. Only she doesn't
know that until she is almost completely swept away.
Age 25. Strong. Strong willed. Feeling behind. Behind in the world of love and romance and intimacy. Like it is
a race.
At age 25, Lani embarks upon a career in dating. Failed date after failed date later, she is frustrated and unsure.
Maybe she should become a nun. An agnostic Jewish lesbian nun, she thinks.
At least she still has her will and her sense and her wit. Those serve her well during her two week summer/fall
relationship with B. But B is too nice. And Lani is too strong willed. And so like good lesbians they become fast
friends.
B will later stop talking to her, somewhere around chapter 9. After too much craziness with Indigo. Indigo, a pivotal
character. Indigo, self proclaimed butchie black dyke from the streets of Chicago. Sexy and scary and elusive.
Lani first meets Indigo before she meets B. Age 25. Dancing at the Midway, a Thursday night dyke bar in Boston.
She knows something is wrong. Her strong will and her even stronger gut tell her that.
But somewhere around chapter 3 Indigo sneaks in. Through a loophole. The authenticity loophole. The riskiness loophole.
Lani's friends had been telling her to take more risks. And her childhood memories had been telling her that her
life lacked authenticity. Who was she, a middle class white girl from the suburbs and from a lily white upstate
New York liberal arts school, to be teaching in the inner city? The loophole.
So this is the story of how Indigo gets in, somewhere around chapter 3, and how she doesn't leave until the epilogue.
The epilogue written years later. Of how a need for authenticity leads to anything but reality.
...
I don't want to write the blurb anymore. I don't want to write about this anymore. About her. About us. About the
abuse. About my recovery.
How is it I can talk about other things but not write about them? I deserve to be writing about other things. And
I try.
But stopping would be too much. I am not ready for that kind of loss. There has been too much loss already. Now
I know about grieving something you never had. Grieving something that was bad.
Because I won't stop doing it until I figure it out. Figure the whole thing out. How it happened. Why it happened.
What role I played. Why it won't get out of my head. Why I need to figure it all out.
I always figure things out. Closure. I don't stop until there is closure. And when there is not I am haunted and
this has haunted me long enough that I am more determined than ever.
And it's not about her anymore. Or protecting her. Possibly it's about figuring her out too. Why she does this.
Why she needs to. Why she can't change. Why she won't change. Whichever it is.
And those who tell me to stop are almost as bad as she was. Because that is fucked up logic. Stop doing something
you can't control. Stop images in your head or tears that just make their way out. And listening to what others
said is what allowed all of this to happen. So fuck them.
I need to know. Why she does it. Why she did it to me. Hurt me when she didn't even know me. Preyed on me. Sought
me out. When she already had people serving every possible function in her life. People for sex, for money, for
a place to crash, for attention. Was I a challenge? A bigger game? I can't understand her illness. Hurting people
for no good reason. Sociopathology. I can't understand it, but I need to.
And she will never tell me. Because she can't. Or she won't. Whichever it is.
And I am not ready to know that. But I do.
So I am left to write about it. Write this novel. The novel, not the blurb. The novel is not finished. Blurbs are
written when the novel is finished. When there is closure. After the epilogue. And that won't be done for years,
just like the blurb said.
I should be in bed right now. In bed with her. She fell asleep hours ago.
She's patient.
And I know she will still be there in the morning.
And I know she won't hold this against me.
And I don't need to be next to her. All the time.
And I am not afraid she will run away.
She will never scare me. On purpose.
I have been crying again lately.
Last night I cried. After I had told her not to come over. Because I needed to sleep. Work and school are crazy
and I just needed to sleep.
I would have never denied you the right to come over. Your entitlement. My gift. Your presence.
But last night I cried. When I imagined you showing up at school. Showing up at school and scaring me and worse,
scaring the kids. Because you have no moral code and to you scaring kids would be fine. Because you were a scared
kid. And you still are.
I was glad she wasn't there last night to see me cry. Or to see me wake up in a cold sweat. After my nightmare.
My nightmare where you were back and I was terrified. And terrorized. I never remember my dreams. But I remember
that. You were handcuffed again. I'm glad she wasn't there to see me like that. Last night when I cried or this
morning in my cold sweat or last May when you were handcuffed outside my front door.
That was right after Circuit Girl. Last night I was supposed to go to Circuit Girl. But I was too tired. From the
kids and from work and from being scared.
I hope my kids are never scared like this. I look in their eyes and pray for that.
And I see red flags with so many of them. The ones who lack empathy. The ones who don't know how to make friends.
The ones who don't fit in. The ones who can't control their emotions. Because now I see what happens when they
grow up. When no one intervenes to help them and they grow up. And they are so scared that they scare others. They
show up at their houses and scream and yell and threaten. And they leave handcuffed. And that image haunts the
dreams of their victims and that image terrorizes the memories of their survivors.
I make the kids look in the faces of the kids they've hurt. And I help them to name their emotions - frustration,
sadness, fear, isolation, loneliness. And I tell them that I still care. And I still love them.
Like I still care about you and like I still love you.
I told that to Danielle today. She is moving back to Canada in a week and I'm still talking about you. Months later.
Almost a year after I met you. "I still care about her," I admitted. "I still worry about her."
"Really?!" She was incredulous. But then she understood. The difficulty with coming to terms with the
ambiguity. With wondering whether you'd ever show up again. And what you would do.
"Honestly, Lani, I don't think you'll ever hear from her again."
"Yeah, I know..."
And I hate that.
Just like I hate you.
And I hate that I know that your phone has been disconnected.
And I hate that 9 out of 10 things still remind me of you. Of your abuse. Of your trauma. Of your ambiguity.
Like the TV special last night. A man on trial for killing his wife and kids. His affairs. His secret life. And
all I could think of was you. That one day I would be called to testify at your trial. For murdering her. Or the
next woman.
Like when I look into the eyes of my kids. And I see you. 15 years ago. And the urgency of intervention flashes
red lights in my head. And the others at work don't understand why I am so committed to this. To making sure they
get it. Empathy. Compassion. Friendship. Honesty. Trust. Responsibility. Prosocial skill development. My mentor
doesn't know why that is my chosen curriculum unit. Why not something more substantive? More content driven? Like
resistance to slavery or Black achievement? And then again I think of you.
Like when she is lying in my bed. With you, she would have waited up. Your insomnia was hers. Your misery was hers.
Your lies were hers. Your abuse was hers. Your fear was hers. Because she has empathy.
And so do I. And that is why she will not see me crying over this. Because it hurts her. Because she has empathy.
And I will not hurt her like that. Make her feel inferior. Or helpless. Because of the traumas you planted in my
head. And my heart.
So I cry alone. Isolation. Loneliness. Fear.
Only unlike you, I know how to deal with those. How to deal with them without forcing them on others.
And I wish the same for you.
Because I hate you, but still I care.
I care because I need to. Because you can't.
Because your traumas still haunt me. Because my traumas still haunt me. Because you knew that. And you didn't care.
And because I should be in bed right now. In bed with her. She fell asleep hours ago.
What I meant to say was no.
No you may not come over again. No you may not call me. No you may not write any more e-mails.
What I meant to say was you don't deserve me. I am too special and too whole and to strong and too fragile for
you to fuck with.
What I meant to say was I don't believe you. I know you lie. I told you that. You admitted it.
What I meant to say was you scare me. Your words and your faces and your volume and your inconsistencies.
What I meant to say was it wasn't my fault. That you hurt. So much. I tried so hard to make it all go away for
you.
What I meant to say was you need more help than I can offer.
What I meant to say was no. I didn't lie. I am not manipulative. I am not immature. I am not only trying to hurt
you. I am not selfish.
What I meant to say was those are projections of yourself onto me.
What I meant to say was I tried. Even when you didn't.
What I meant to say was you are not fair. When you lie there and tell me I am doing nothing right. I am hurting
you on purpose. I do not consider your needs.
What I meant to say was ouch. That hurts. When you touch me like that. When you yell at me like that. When you
accuse me like that. When you ignore me like that. When you threaten me like that. When you sweet talk me like
that.
What I meant to say was you are crazy. For thinking I would never catch on. For thinking I would seriously play
this game forever. For thinking I am still jealous of her because she is still playing the game.
What I meant to say was you are mean. For exposing my insecurities. And exploiting them.
What I meant to say was I don't trust you. You don't make sense and you make me unsafe.
What I meant to say was I am not safe. In this space. With you.
What I meant to say was stop. Slow down. I am not ready to tell you all that. You can't make me.
What I meant to say was you are not real. Even though you make me feel so real. My pain is so real. Because of
your pain.
What I meant to say was you are not my past. Even though you evoke it. The painful past of illegitimate memories.
Inauthentic pain. Irrational fear.
What I meant to say was your pain is not more legitimate than mine. And yours can't legitimize mine. Even though
I wanted it to.
What I meant to say was shhhhhhh. Stop talking. Stop yelling. Stop banging. Stop whispering. Stop seducing.
What I meant to say was I don't accept your apology. And I take mine back.
What I meant to say was get help. You need it.
What I meant to say was good-bye.
I wish someone had told me that one year later it would be no easier.
That even though this is supposed to be over it feels like it is all starting again.
Because now the weather is changing back to what it was a year ago and now school is done for two weeks and now
I have time to think about it.
I wish someone had told me that that I didn't need this. To feel loved. Or important.
I wish someone had told me that one year later the particles in my brain would still be rearranged. That one year
later the naiveté would be gone. That one year later I would want to be that naive again.
I wish someone had told me that hurt hurts. Forever.
I wish someone had told me that some people don't care about that. That some people were not programmed to care.
I wish someone had told me that you either have passion or safety, but not both.
I wish someone had told me how to erase memories. How to make them less scary. How to take them back and make them
into something that doesn't wake me up at night.
I wish someone had told me that this would take a while. That it is okay if it takes a while. That memories of
ranting and threats and handcuffs and hysteria cannot be willed away. Or replaced.
I wish someone had told me that even when you think it is over, it is not. That even when you think the last of
the memories no longer terrorizes you, it fights its way to the forefront of your consciousness and makes it its
mission to haunt your dreams.
I wish someone had told me that my body would never feel the same. That passion would be scary. That I would avoid
it at all costs.
I wish someone had told me not to watch TV. Because memories will creep up and creep in and take over at any moment.
Like watching a battered woman hide from her husband or watching a trial of a sociopath or watching someone fall
in love or watching a kid being shot.
I wish someone had told me that just because you don't need to write about something for three months doesn't mean
you're done writing about it. Or that just because you don't want to write about it doesn't mean you're done writing
about it.
I wish someone had told me of the power of scents and photographs and lost phrases to elicit unwanted memories.
I wish someone had told me how to make her face go away. The sweet face or the angry face or the blank face or
the seducing face or the enraged face or the slick face or the scared face. Especially the scared face.
I wish someone had told me to stop. I wish I had listened. I wish I had not been so stubborn or so swept up or
so caught up or so swept away or so washed away or so damaged.
I wish I didn't know what I know.
I wish someone had told me that snow storms would never be the same. That flannel sheets would take on a whole
new meaning. That I would gag whenever I smelled coconut. That I would turn my head whenever I saw anyone who resembled
her.
I wish someone had told me that fear and intrigue cannot be separated from one another.
I wish someone had told me how to live with fear. And not be consumed by it.
I wish someone had told me how to write this poem. How to write it and have it make sense. How to write it and
not feel stupid. How to write it and not be stuck.
Because stuck is recurring. You can unstick yourself for so long and then stuck creeps back in.
I wish someone had told me how to change the appearance of things in my head. So that when I look out my front
window it doesn't look the same as it did that night.
I wish someone had told me how not to make excuses for people. When they hurt you.
I wish someone had told me how to stay angry. How to stay angry and not let it turn back into compassion. Or fear.
Or longing.
Better yet, I wish someone had told me how to let it go. How to forget. How to forget without letting go. How to
let go without forgetting.
And now I am done writing about that but there is still time and so all I can think of is that I am tired. Because
I did not go to bed until 3 am and even then I did not really sleep. And that has not happened in a long time.
And today I was not really hungry and that has not happened in a long time. And today I craved a cigarette. And
that has not happened in a long time.
Because school started last summer just when I needed it to. And now school is over for the time being and now,
for the first time in a long time, I have time. Time to think and time to remember. And it is not fun. And I don't
want to tell anyone about it. Because it's supposed to be over. I get it and it was bad and it was wrong and it
was unfair and so I get it. I get it now.
But still in me is that sick need to figure out those things I will never figure out.
My therapist says this will be hard. The anniversaries. That they come when I have time off. And that I should
just acknowledge that.
Acknowledge that? Acknowledge what? That I sit and try to wrap my brain around how much can happen in a year? That
I try to remember what I was thinking last year? When I thought she was just intriguing and shy and sexy and elusive?
When I thought I needed just a little more intrigue and sexiness in my life?
Acknowledge that within one month of that she had successfully picked apart my brain and my psyche and my spirit
until I was cascading into the kind of insanity that I then need to analyze a year later? The kind that wakes you
up even once you are better?
5 more minutes.
An eternity.
Like trying to keep your eye on a single snowflake as it makes its way to the ground. When it is windy. And you
had always thought that snow fell quickly. And it swirls and gets mixed up with other snowflakes and you sit and
try to watch just one. To see what path it will take. To see if you can stick with it. When it starts to confuse
you or try to throw you off. Because you are persistent. And it is fascinating. To watch.
Like the snowflakes I watched after she would leave. Or when I was starving. Or dehydrated. Snowflakes I watched
after trying to stare at my own eyes in a mirror the same way I would a snowflake. Like a puzzle. Trying to stay
fixed on that one snowflake even after it has hit the ground.
I wish someone had had told me that tracing the paths of snowflakes was this addictive.
I am not your fucking Christmas tree ornament.
To be taken out once a year and strung up and admired.
I am not there to be put away in a box when you are done. When you have had enough of the Christmas frenzy and
so you pack me up with the tinsel and lights and angel or the broken electric window menorah. The menorah where
you can only have six nights of Chanukah because the third and fifth nights are broken.
I am not your stupid little intern. Your Yes Sir, Absolutely Sir let me stroke your fragile male ego with my uniformed
inexperienced little hands so you can feel better about sucking at your job.
And speaking of sucking, I am not here at your service for your sucking pleasure.
I am not your good little girl, lick your boots until my tongue is black from the shit you feed me little girl.
I am not your bow down to my mentor little girl because he claims to be feminist and anti-racist, but he has no
problem talking over women, exercising privilege over colleagues of color.
I am not your femme, your lipstick lesbian, your less threatening dyke.
I am not passing for straight and I am not wearing my lipstick for your viewing pleasure.
I am not your activist or your passive stander-by. I will act when and how I want to and not only for the causes
you think I need to. Because the rights of children in my own city to earn a decent education, to be free from
tracking and derailing and demoralizing and deculturalization means more to me some days than your right to bare
your breasts in public and I am not here for you to tell me that I am fighting for the wrong causes.
I am not your average girl and I am not the girls I resemble. I don't want your hand accidentally rubbing my ass
or your eyes lingering on my breasts when I'm just trying to ride the subway.
I am not your baby dyke or your next generation. Your future. Be your own damn future.
I am not trying to challenge you or challenge your assumptions.
I am not here to be invisible. For you to make your homophobic or misogynist or racist comments in front of me.
Because I don't look like the kind of girl who cares. Because I am not a womyn with a y or a trans-activist or
wearing a shirt or waving flag or flashing a bumper sticker in your face that screams who I am or who I am not
or who I am fighting.
I am not the girl you want me to be or the woman you want to avoid. Neatly packaged and transparent.
I am not the girls I resemble.
I sang the Jeopardy theme. That's the only way I can gauge 30 seconds without counting.
30 seconds is a really short time in final Jeopardy. I never know how they do it. I can get lots of those answers,
but never quickly enough.
30 seconds is a really long time just sitting with your eyes closed. Suddenly I get more questions than answers.
Like Jeopardy. Answering the answer with a question.
My questions now are mundane and trivial. Wear my hair curly or straight? Pants or skirts today? Eyeliner or no?
Brown belt or black? Go to the gym or go home and watch bad TV? And as mundane and trivial as these conundrums
are, they cause me great anxiety. I even cry. Because they seem to have huge ramifications. If I wear my hair curly
today, I'll have to wear it up until I shower again. If I wear it straight, I'll have to spend two hairs drying
and ironing it, but I can wear it down for two more days. See what I mean?
A year ago, I had no time for such trivial pursuits. And I am glad I do now. Glad that the things that cause me
the most stress are how I am going to administer a reading assessment for a course when I really don't get how
to do it. And I feel unqualified and inept and I cry. Like I cried last night before the Wizard of Oz. At the Wang
Center. It was free. A free showing of the Wizard of Oz and I was 7 years old again. And maybe it was anticipating
being deathly afraid of the flying monkeys once again, but I cried before it started. Out of stress. Over this
damn assessment. The assessment that is the assignment I don't get. And she held my hand and told me we could leave,
but we had both walked separately in freezing rain and snow to have a fun and silly date on a Monday night and
I wasn't going to let a looming reading assessment or flying monkeys ruin it.
So my head is filled with these things. Small things. Trivial things. Trivia. Trivia for my life. And I have to
wonder whether or not they are a diversion. >From the bigger questions. The ones from a year ago. Because I
am supposed to be done with those. They are all answered and so they are done. She was crazy. She was mean. She
was sick. She was abusive. She was a sociopath. Only, like in Jeopardy, those answers leave you with questions
as a response.
And so during the Wizard of Oz I thought of her. Because I had written about that. About how I was Dorothy and
she was the Wicked Witch and the stupid fuck behind the curtain all in one. Behind the Curtain, it was called.
And I read it at last week's slam and people didn't get it and they didn't like it and so I let my mind turn back
to trivia. Maybe I should have worn my hair curly, I thought, or worn different shoes. Maybe they didn't like the
glittery shoes.
And then that was a reference to another piece about this time last year. Or almost.
So I do that. Trivial questions to avoid serious answers.
But my dreams reveal them. Like last night. Last night after the Wizard of Oz when I dreamt she was chasing us
through a building. And I never remember my dreams, but I remembered that. She was chasing us and trying to kill
us. And I woke up before I could answer how it ended. And when I turned over in bed and told her about it, she
asked if it was the flying monkeys that had me so restless. And I wish it had been. Like when I was 7 and images
of those flying monkeys tormented me in my sleep for weeks.
But this time it was her. And it has been more than weeks. And I don't care and I don't want to care. Because I
have better things to think about. And feel. And better reasons to cry.
And it is not what it was last year. Yearning or confusion or sadness. It is fear. Utter fear. Of running into
her. Because she has seen her twice at school. Maybe more. Maybe more and she is not telling me because she knows
then what will happen. But Friday night at the opening of the new club, we both felt it. Looking over our shoulders
the whole night. Because it's a new club and a new scene and what better place to find new prey? I am starting
to understand the predatory mind. All of my questions and my dreams and my nightmares have allowed me a window.
And it's scary as hell. And that is why I looked over my shoulder the whole night instead of having fun. Even a
year later.
And I wonder how much longer I will have to do that. Because my questions have shown me answers. And my answers
make me question. How safe is it? How safe do I want it to be? Can passion ever again be safe? When will the crying
stop? Not the crying over curly hair or reading assessments but the crying for things lost and things wounded and
things assaulted and things manipulated and things deceived and things harmed and things left unanswered?
So a year is long and short all in one. Like 30 seconds. Depending on context and vantage point. Because a year
later you can still be in the same place, only a very different one.
Shoes are a very important accessory to consider when you are performing. Too high and you might trip. Or look
like you are trying too hard. Too low and you'll look even shorter than you already are, which is really hard,
because you'll have to move the microphone twice as much before you perform.
I wore glittery shoes at last week's slam. Silver glittery shoes. And the rest of my outfit was black. And I don't
think they liked it. or my poetry. The judges, that is. And audience members approached me in secret afterwards,
telling me how disappointed they were. Not in me, but in the judges. And it made me feel a little better.
Because I have never lost a slam. Not there. And if I had lost to serious competition it would have been one thing.
That's happened before. Not there but elsewhere. And I was fine with it. I got my ass kicked and it felt good.
Because I had held my own with Boston's best and that's enough for me. And hearing them and watching them made
me want to try harder. Write more. Write better.
But that is not what happened last week. Last week embodied what I used to hate about women's slams. Applauding
only the women who say cunt and pussy and ignoring those with something to say. Something substantive. And not
something the judges only assume is substantive because it does a half-assed job of referencing Emily Dickinson,
like the winner, but something truly meaningful. Or at least well executed.
And the runner up was worse than the winner. Woman, I am woman, woman I am. Hear me. Hear my cries, my cries of
pain, my painful cries. Please.
Now I am the first to say we need safe spaces for reading works about assault and violation. Hell, Ren says she
started the Amazon slam because men made rude comments to women after they'd perform in mixed venues. Some woman
would do a piece about sexual assault and a guy would approach her later, whispering, "That was really hot."
And that's happened to me too so I know. I get it. But I also know that just because a poem is about rape doesn't
mean it's good. And yes she has courage for doing it. Damn does she have courage. I do a poem about sexual assault.
I know about that. But it doesn't mean it's a good poem. And who are the judges to score that higher than one about
abuse? Maybe a sarcastic and witty one about abuse, not one filled with tired old clichés and run down and
played out images, but courageous nonetheless. Only I don't expect to be scored for courage. I expect to be scored
for the product. And the delivery. And hers sucked. And she was the fucking runner up.
And I wish I had just taken the stage and done what they wanted. Done what they wanted and parodied it so they
could see how ridiculous it is. Woman. I am woman. Cunt. Cuuunnnnt. Cunnnnnnnnnnt. My cunt, my pussy. Pussy, pusssssy.
puuuuuuuuussy. Deep sighs. Exhalations. Contrived voice. The cadence. The one designed to hypnotize the audience
so they don't bother to notice that you're not really saying anything new.
But I didn't. I did the pieces I wanted to do. Some strategy, but not exploitation. And I lost.
And I wish I could just write more. Write more without writing for an audience. Because now, whenever I write,
it is for an audience. And so only 1/10 of my thoughts make it to the page. If that. Because you write differently.
Different words in a different way with different sounds and different structures when you know you will be on
a stage with a microphone. And I wonder what would come out if I had never set foot on a stage. Because now I am
the type of writer I hate. Writing only for an audience. Paralyzed when I have no muse. No muse worthy of a microphone.
Because the microphone is safety. The microphone and the lights and my high heeled shoes - I could never read without
them. The librarian at school, after I told her I was a performance poet, asked to hear my stuff sometime. And
I froze at the idea. Recite a poem in the Cambridge Friends School library? For just one person? Can you do that?
Read without performing? Without the safety net of the microphone and lights and applause.
Like when the people come up to you after a slam or a performance and you never know how to respond or what to
say. Especially when they linger. Because they think they know you, and in some way they do, but you know nothing
about them and you smile and thank them and wonder what it is they think. Do they think you are a drama queen?
That you act like this all the time? That you are the life of the party? Because mostly I stay at home in sweat
suits and slippers and pet my cat and watch reality TV or court shows as I search Craigslist for interesting opportunities
to make extra cash. And I am on the floor most of the day with 6 year olds, and the words fuck or dyke or rants
like this never leave my mouth.
But they would never know that and that's all part of the performance. The performance that is not really a performance,
but just the other side. A bigger me. Not contrived or made up or artificial. My own words. My own sounds. My own
thoughts. Only bigger. Bigger, but not artificial.
And I have no idea how to end this piece. Because I edit as I go and I imagine performing it. And some will love
it. Finally. Finally we'll point out what's wrong with this whole damn thing. But then I know I am giving myself
too much credit. Because apparently some people like it contrived. Contrived and affected and cliché and
tired. Painful really.
But mine are contrived too. Contrived because they are for an audience. Because the microphone is safe. The judges
may not be, but the microphone is. With it I am me. Sweat suit and cats and reality TV me, only bigger. And more
entertaining. With cute shoes.
She says she likes kissing that sunken spot next to my thigh. In between my thigh and my belly. “It’s always
soft,” she comments. And I trace it with my finger to see if she is right. And it is hollow and deep, both at the
same time.
And my body is often two things at once. Fat and thin. Full and hungry. Tired and fidgety.
That’s what happens when you have a relationship with your body based on ambivalence. One minute I look in the
mirror and I am beautiful. My curves perfect. My skin smooth. My blemishes insignificant. My body rested and energized.
And a minute later my mind revolts. My stomach is too fat. I feel too full. The last piece of pasta threw me over
the edge. My hair is the wrong length. The wrong texture. The wrong style. My skin is pulling too tight around
my thighs. And my arms. I scratch. I scratch at it to make it go away. To take off the skin that has invaded my
body.
For two minutes kissing feels right. It tingles and it warms and it soothes. Goosebumps on my neck. Shivers in
my toes. Butterflies in my stomach.
And then the goose bumps become pins and the shivers become knives and the butterflies become banshees. And I leave.
I just leave. I float away. And I make fists.
This relationship with my body. Cured but not.
In college I didn’t eat. Off and on for a couple of years. Because controlling what does or doesn’t pass through
your body is a high unlike any other. Like beating the system. And soon it turns on you. And one grain of rice
expands in your stomach and its razor sharp edges push against the lining of your entire digestive tract and you
need to stop. Eating. You need to stop because it hurts. Eating hurts. And it is not anorexia and they don’t know
what to call it. You call it crazy.
And then I had been in control of it. For over 5 years I was in control of it. And I enjoyed every last bite of
food that entered my mouth.
And then it crept back in. And my skin did not fit. A suit that was too tight. One I had outgrown.
And when I could control nothing else, I found solace in controlling food. In getting full while watching her eat.
In the joy of growing smaller as she grew bigger. And I ate again but it was never the same.
And one year later the anxiety came back. The flash-forward super warp speed moments that had also been dormant
for 5 years. They too crept back in. A bad hair day. A bad skin day. A fat day. Panic attacks. All related. Only
the panic attacks didn’t happen last year. They waited a full year to make their comeback. And when I saw her on
the street they hit with a vengeance. Because it was like seeing a ghost. Or a predator.
And that night I did not eat. And that night kissing hurt. Really hurt. Remembering times of poisonous kisses.
Poisonous because they feel good. And soothing. Venom disguised as an antidote. To pain. To past pain and past
traumas.
Really the venom snuck in. To every cell in my brain and every cell in my blood and every cell in my fat and every
cell in my stomach and in every cell in my skin. And I have purged myself of much of it. But it stays in my brain
and in my skin. Near my ears and near my eyes and near my lips. And it throbs at times of fear and it itches at
times of stress and it stings at times of joy. It lives in my skin. In my stomach. And in the sunken spot between
my thigh and my belly. Deep and hollow. Like cellular memories.
Smells and tastes do not exist in words. Especially smells. The sense of smell is located in your brain stem,
the first part of the brain to develop. At birth, a baby can recognize a diaper scented with her mother’s breast
milk. Long before words or strings of visual images or memories located in sounds and pictures, our memories exist
in our sense of smell.
I find it maddening. That smell is not words. That no words exist to describe smells. That smells are not linear
and smells are not relational and smells are neither rational nor bound. And worse, smells cannot be recalled.
I can will myself into seeing an image that is not there or hearing a song I have not heard in years. I can close
my eyes and see my mother’s face and I can hear her voice. Strings and strings of memories in sounds and pictures
and mostly words. But I cannot recall her smell until it is there. The real thing or an approximation.
And it’s maddening. These senses that exist outside the bounds of reason or words. Prelingual memories. Memories
that have no order, no event, no storyline.
The other day I was putting change in the meter. And I smelled Jamaica. I smelled a semester of living in Kingston
Jamaica. And I did not move and I did not blink. I only sniffed. To place it. And even after I had placed it, I
really hadn’t, because all I knew was that it was Jamaica. No pictures. No events. No words. Just a fleeting memory.
And the more I tried to recall the scent after it was gone, the further away it seemed to travel. Like it was determined
to be elusive. Like the smell knew I was trying to categorize it and name it and force it into a storyline it did
not like. And as the wind blew it further and further away, so too did my consciousness push it further and further
down, back into my brain stem.
I will myself to do it. To recall the scents. To name them and place them. Apple pie, vanilla, coconut, pine –
those are the easy ones. Not easy to recall but easy to place. In part. But what about the smell of a person? Of
your mother or of your first kiss or of your dog or of the lake at summer camp?
Spirits use scents to make their presence known. People will smell their father’s pipe or their mother’s perfume
or their lover’s neck – and they know. They know they are there. But in spirit, not in words.
And I wish I could exist more in spirit than in words. In single moments. In the present. Not strings of words
or images or images attached to words or words conveying images. But moments. In the present. Like smells.
And that’s why they’re maddening. They force me into the present. When I would rather be in the past or in the
future or volleying between the two. The smell thrusts me into a moment free of words.
And I wish there were a smell right now. To remind me. To remind me of what I am talking about. Because I don’t
know it until it’s there.
Like the smell of rain. It’s not the smell of water and I don’t know what it is. Just rain. And you only know it
when you smell it. And it forces you to expand your lexicon. What does rain smell like? Can something smell wet?
Or damp? Or whimsical?
Children would say yes. They are not yet completely bound by the conventions of words or semantics. Something can
taste blue or look yummy or smell cold. And I wish I could be back in that place. In that place and time when words
were vehicles and tools rather than roadblocks and obstacles.
And it’s not fair. That the smells you hope to smell frequently are obscure and infrequent. Your childhood bedroom
or your favorite teacher or your most comfy pajamas. A swing set. But then an evil person who invades your life
smells like coconut. And it’s not fair.
If I were smarter, I would research the brain stem. Figure out exactly where scent is. And why it cannot be recalled.
And how to build a bridge between that space, that cavern, that memory box - and words. To give it a name. And
a story.
If there was such thing as a bad-ass new kid on the block, Donnie Wahlberg was it. Donnie’s face was always
scrunched up and tough, his jeans ripped, his hat slightly tilted, his hair mussed. Some girls swooned for Jordan,
the suave one, or Joey, the small and cute and probably gay one. But I was a Donnie kind of girl. And when I outgrew
Donnie by the end of middle school, it was Dylan McKay. Some of my friends preferred Brandon Walsh, the squeaky-clean
sensitive guy. With the perfect family. And the perfect grades. And work ethic. But not me. No, I opted for Dylan.
Scar on the eyebrow, raspy voice, alcoholic father. Sexy, elusive, unpredictable.
And who knew I would grow up to be a lesbian who looked for the same thing in women? Who would fall for the one
who was sexy, elusive, unpredictable and then some.
Some things don’t change. Some things are comforting. Even when they’re not meant to be.
A couple of weeks ago I saw the 3rd Harry Potter movie. I had read the book a couple of years ago and I should
have reread it before seeing the movie, but I didn’t. So I had forgotten about them. The dementors. The creatures
that guard Azkhaban Prison. Whose only purpose is to find you and fill your core with coldness and fear. Who make
you afraid by preying on your fears. Who are skilled and practiced in sucking out your soul.
And I cried. I cried because I had known a dementor. And now I had an image for her. And it looked scarier on the
screen than I had remembered in my own life and the scariest part was that in my own life, it had really been scarier.
Most people never know dementors. And they should never have to. Because there is nothing worse. Nothing worse
than something who knows only how to suck out your soul. And your spirit. I only wish she had looked more like
a dementor.
When Harry first saw a dementor, his body became icy cold and his hair stood on end. Because he knew. He sensed
it. And the same thing had happened to me when I first saw her. And at first I paid attention to it. Stay away.
Stay far away. Chills up my spine and pains in my stomach. And I clenched my teeth. But the lure of it was too
strong. Of the tough guy. Of saving and being saved by the tough guy. The one who would hurt me. The one who would
make me remember the hurt. Make me remember it and then suck it out of me.
Leah was an invisible princess. She lived in an invisible castle surrounded by invisible people in an invisible
village – the Land of Invisible Truths.
In an invisible world, you never have your own footing. Or your own story. And Leah fought to hold onto hers. Even
when the invisible elders of the village tried to beat it out of her. With words and actions that made no sense.
Leah fought to hold onto her invisible truth. To invent words and stories in her head that would paint a visible
picture of her invisible reality.
Because the elders in her land thought it best to remain invisible at all times. And pain especially was to be
neither seen nor heard nor real. A land where happiness and sanity were illusions. Where all the invisible people
looked the same. And pretended not to notice tears or bruises or damaged psyches or wounded spirits.
And Leah knew she was a princess. And that princesses were to be grateful and happy and sweet. And perfect. And
that as long as pain was not visible it was not real. That princesses did not really feel pain or have reason to
complain. That even the most hurtful words or the most unpredictable actions by her mother or father or royal guards
or elders of the village did not compare to the suffering faced by those who lived outside of the boundaries of
her invisible land. That people who lived in visible worlds had real pain. Visible pain.
So she sought out visible lands and visible people. Who would show her what visible pain was. Authentic. Legitimate.
Undeniable. Visual.
Leah never intentionally brought physical pain to her body, but she understood those who did. Those who cut themselves
as a release, to see and feel a physical manifestation of their emotional pain.
Those she left behind in the Land of Invisibility never understood why she left. Why she left and sought out worlds
outside of illusions. They preferred to stay in the shadows. In the funhouse. In a place where truths are hidden.
But Leah knew why she left. She wanted to see her reflection.
If you have enjoyed Lani Radack's Poetry, then please be certain to e-mail her at radacklani[at]hotmail.com and thank her for posting her Work.
Click here for a list of all of Lani Radack's Stories and Poetry at Sapphic Voices Authoresses.
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