Growing up in this neighborhood
is like frantic conversations with flowers
and roses rushing in.
Children are tiny scarecrows
stitched for protection from superstitions.
The hallways creak,
haunted by arguing dollmakers
who think their kids are asleep.
Someday the little bodies of hay
will hear the wicked and spectacular histories
of what happened to their heroes.
The neighborhood is a trap
of walls and invisible wolves.
She’s stung by bees if she tries to leave.
As she stares up,
she feels the formidable pulse
of the thing that’s waiting for her.
She cuts the colors out of her fingers:
the yellow from her sunny attic prison
and the red, scorching red
that chokes the right words.
The rich red beckoned her
out the window.
She has never known such a color before,
and it tells her of all its shades:
burning tantrums that end in backhands;
the touch of two pounding hearts,
one big, one small;
worms caught in the blushing apples of a face;
the fever crawling in the trees after a kiss.
She holds her childhood to the sun
and remembers that she’s young;
and because of youth
she can go as high as she wants
until the hearts drift from her body
into hot air balloons.
She passes her room
and the hairs stand on her neck,
moving dinosaur bones in her back.
She’s not scared, she is transcending.
She fits like a spoon
into the dark, dark, dark,
and emerges a message on burning paper
that reads,
“When the mountains part in the distance
like shoulder blades,
and the violet silhouette takes my breath
like warm wine,
remember me for my energy in the air,
and how you wrung me from your hair
like saltwater.”
Due to an audio disaster, "Aroma" premiered as a silent film at Denver's first ever Open Screen Night. It took runner-up, and that tasted delicious.
At October's OSN, Mayonai$$e's newest music video premiered, in which I play the exasperated "Dr. Mary Jane." I have no qualms with this song getting stuck in my head!
meminso is the laughing chick in red tights. Wait, that's me.
