Inside the Body
Museum
entry fee
looping floss around the lame tooth
will lop it off, falling to the pile
like loose change—a mouth
is the entrance to all i am
willing to give you. the markings
on a lover’s neck share the mountains
and valleys on my own arm,
i have yet to taste any other part
of me.
exhibit: the last drop of ocean, bottled
again, I see it again,
mirrors in mirrors, shattered,
stones thrown for the glass’s gift,
for what it hides, and i
have taken the shards—claw
sharp—to my paperthin skin
and have seen the ocean
that sings within me,
bottled, traded, sitting now
behind bulletproof glass. the exhibit
is a body itself, framed against
sterile white, the lacquered plaque reads
please do not touch
exhibit: star-knife
in the room of the manufactured Sun,
the glass globe is not a cage
wealthy enough to hold its fire
and i can feel it reaching for me,
its flickering fingers—fire-heavy,
soft and serrated—pushing life
like a knife past
any flesh it can, burrowing
its blade deep into bleached bone.
like a dog licking its wound,
i have spit on the smoldering pit
it has left, sedentary smoke
silhouetting my body–
a dead star will bleed in the sky for centuries.
hallways
varicose veins,
rivers running over rocks with the patience of penitentes
pillars of ice, of blood, deoxidized.
i have stood still too long,
unable to take a body that does not feel like mine
through ports i know, somewhere inside, would not ground me.
instead i stay,
bury myself in the sun-slaughtered sand.
when i scoop my hands through the bed,
all that runs over
my arms are spiders.
exhibit: eyes, or seeds
like bloody tears, the windows
are fogged–red condensed
between the panes. my eyes lie
through black floaters and sunspots
it cannot believe the gospel
any mirror preaches–
i’ve lived most comfortably inside
the walls of a funhouse. i’ve hidden
the images of wealth, of love,
of care for a body i can only call mine,
i carry its weight in my sight
but have never been strong enough
to make it up these Sisyphusian hillsides.
i’ve cried more fluids than blood, kept tears
in jars to water the plants
fated to die over and over again
in whatever cruel game i’ve created
as their god. my eyes buried
in pockets of dry soil, lowlight,
blooming.
exit: gift shop
the body as
child’s drawing–the torso, a perfect
circle, hollow dots for eyes–
hanging by a magnet on a fridge.
as
nesting doll, _____ within _____
the pieces are picked apart
the core containing nothing but itself
as
overpriced coffee,
dripping from jittery,
bloody-nailed fingers
as
a bound book of bruises
presenting the history
of its brutalism
as
automatic sliding doors, broken,
left open, the draft either grating
or a welcome touch, an offering
into the jealous warmth of the sun.
Andrew Walker lives in Denver, Colorado. You can find him on Twitter @adwalker1994
Euphony Journal 