What it is to be my parent's daughter

by sam

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What it is to be my parent’s daughter

I am a butterfly pinned, I hear the music from another house.

My mind is a rubber band -

taut, ready to s

                          no nap back into my fingers,

                                                    bitterly untamed,

                          wings banded with invisible marks,

music beats louder

above me, on the next block - vibrations muffled through my soles.

My limbs have not brushed the tall grass in centuries. I

am ageing

preciously

deep red

fine wine cellared

staring down from the barrel

thoughts swirling the bottleneck of

what it feels to be my brother. I

pour myself out

save the dregs for myself, blood wine viscous

soaking spiked leaves of mint

never sated,

hungry for

more self-

less cowardice.

Untethering

guilt congeals,

my second heart leaking

through phantom stitches, it jiggles

queasy heat searing my diaphragm

off-kilter —love swirls like

foam, like

oils of the sea

desperate to become one

with water, angry and boiled— I

could crash

until there is

nothing



Absinthe-spiked memory of empty syllables —

                         o of a fight

                       d

                     n

                   e

                 c

               s

             e

           r

         c

pearly grin on a roaring tiger, through loosened lips

your teeth s

                   i

                   n

                   k my tongues of flame but

blow

                       by

           blown

away, low heat and entropy

dissolved yo

                    u ndo, this grotesque family puzzle

one piece missing—

you

gutted yourself on the rocks —

married the sea, I hear

shaky shots of lost foot-

age sliced into red and      blue and      bile.



I hunt stalk the grass on beat

look—

a sheer cliff



suspended my childhood

absence, potholes of perfect spheres

scooped

my skin, my arms

flailed,

an inverted octopus

on display