etcetera, etcetera

the needle is the size of my favorite stuffed rabbit and runs through a length of clear plastic tube into a retractable syringe. a loosened roll of sterile gauze curls delicately against the metal surgical tray, bottles of iodine uncapped and ready. i watch my doctor choose a swatch of gauze as he fixed me with a stare that could cut diamonds.  “what’re you always looking back here for? i'm gonna stick this in the wrong lung if you don’t sit still.” i shrug .  "i dunno. just nervous, i  guess. you said it was gonna hurt.” he nods, motioning me into place.  "i did say that, didn’t i?” “yeah.” “honesty is important to me. i’m not going to lie to you just because you’re a kid.” the pressure in my chest pushes the words to the back of my throat. “but last week you told me that the nurses stay up late eating ice cream and they put us to bed early because they don’t want to share,” i remind him, gripping the table in splayed palms. dr. colucci rubs circles on my lower back wi

once upon a time, my grandmother picked me up from school in a freshly washed white car, ready to try on homecoming dresses. before alzheimer's disease and covid-19, there were passenger seat drives with her at the wheel and days spent running errands. sweet curtains of tulle and lace; strappy heels and a slip to match, pearl earrings and pit stops for pizza and ice cream. we take our seats by the window and it's nanny across the table, so the words fall effortlessly from my lips. before there was jake scott and his heart songs, there was  the best day  by taylor swift and the two of us living it together. another year older and it's gone again, each day spinning into the next. years pass before my bleary eyes and i am losing track of the colors. five years to the day my brother barely graduates with his english degree, i vow to never send him a word of my writing. he's too sharp. too succinct. a master of words, cursed with the mind of hemingway and all too familiar wi

break me down. make me useful. excavate the heart until you hit passion; the soft, raw, bleeding center. wipe it clean as you extract it. don't let the mess of it scare you the way i did. wrap whatever is left in newspaper and toss it next to my eyebrows, tits, and sense of humor in a box marked ‘salvageable.’  crack my head open clean like a summer melon and scrape out the lost, twisted, wishful thoughts with a spoon. throw most of it in the trash. save my laugh in a music box and give it to my father, under care of my grandmother. i learned the soundtrack of life's joy from reading their lips. it would be selfish to bury their gifts. i want them to know that i remember who gave them to me. weave the hard won self-love into a crown studded with whatever confidence i had left. wear it yourself or give it away -- but let the hope behind it rest a minute. put it in a shadow box with the heart it spawned from, and give them a minute to remember each other. they've

your old life, but all the colors are muted a little. your old life, but faster and a lot more painful. it’s everything you imagined it would be, & so temporary that the central line in your chest aches to say goodbye. you are a guest here. in this body and in this world, you are only passing through. my thoughts bump into each other like two strangers on a subway car — wholly eclipsed by a moment, for a moment. stunned. ready to move away from each other the second it becomes possible. we pass through this day every time the sun rises, yet still we find ourselves to be strangers . my thoughts don’t know each other.  the air sits wrong in my lungs. strangers . unfamiliar because we have no reason to make each other's acquaintance, reality and i. i'm craving drinks i've never tasted, and the world has never been so still. i find my inspiration fused to a peppermint at the bottom of my grandmother's purse and slip the candy-coated nostalgia into my first draft, words

  “she hates how much it rains, but it's raining all the time. she said, "i’d like to go home, i don't feel right in these clothes, and i might be losing my mind.” they say that insanity is doing the same things over & over for a chance at different results, and maybe that’s true. but if it is, then why do we define hope the same way? my tongue twists. i am wrong, as i am a lot of things these days. pretentious. aggressive. delicate like a bomb, not fine china; waiting for the right catalyst to make me explode. definitions are no longer my friend, if they ever were at all. they twist my tongue into foreign shapes. i used to understand words; knew how to use them. in the beginning, language was my friend.  𝙝𝙤𝙥𝙚, 𝙣𝙤𝙪𝙣: a feeling of expectation and desire for a certain thing to happen. a feeling of trust. grounds for believing that something good may happen. 𝙝𝙤𝙥𝙚, 𝙫𝙚𝙧𝙗: to want something to occur or be the case. intent, if possible, to do something. i live

  “𝘪 𝘳𝘦𝘮𝘦𝘮𝘣𝘦𝘳 𝘣𝘦𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘵 𝘮𝘺 𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘴; 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘪𝘥𝘥𝘭𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘯𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵, 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘧𝘪𝘳𝘴𝘵 𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘯𝘪𝘯𝘨. 𝘮𝘺 𝘳𝘰𝘰𝘮 𝘭𝘪𝘬𝘦 𝘢 𝘤𝘩𝘶𝘳𝘤𝘩, 𝘷𝘰𝘪𝘤𝘦𝘴 𝘥𝘰𝘸𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘩𝘢𝘭𝘭; 𝘪 𝘣𝘢𝘳𝘦𝘭𝘺 𝘮𝘢𝘥𝘦 '𝘦𝘮 𝘰𝘶𝘵, 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘵𝘪𝘮𝘦𝘴 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘥𝘰𝘯'𝘵 𝘸𝘢𝘯𝘵 𝘵𝘰 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸.” you are the stained glass i stared at every sunday for eighteen years. you are the kneel and bow at the end of a pew; a sign of the cross and a mass card with tear-blurred ink. you are the fractured, gasping sobs echoing through the basement of a funeral parlor in brooklyn; i knock on the door and suddenly, you are the silence that hides grief by swallowing it whole. you are blatant refusal to turn the knob. i am all bent safety pins and picked locks, never quite sure what ‘no’ is supposed to mean when it’s your lips that form the words. “𝘫𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘨𝘪𝘮𝘮𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘸𝘪𝘥𝘦 𝘴𝘮𝘪𝘭𝘦 𝘮𝘢𝘥𝘦 𝘧𝘰𝘳