Keep Art Alive :: “Prophecy Catastrophe” :: Art by Sarah Joncas
A momentary bursts of energy sparked something rash and careless in her. Beneath the flesh,
within the deep dark secret side of her longing,
to be safe,
under a blanket of heart-shaped promises,
to stand inside something warm and soft,
while losing her lackluster passions,
sitting still beside him,
without a breaking heart.
She threw on a new dress,
one that had no stories woven in the seams,
nothing like the girl she had been in that snapshot.
The fuck girl,
finger defiantly waving,
hiding the shy side of sorrow in her troubled eyes,
pale skin,
jagged points of sleepless nights,
that darkened the underside of her lashes.
Too much of everything,
nothing.
His hand waving again,
inviting her to fall deeper into a spiral of decay.
She charmed him without even trying,
by just arriving,
breathless,
pulse beating unnaturally.
He saw her there and averted his gaze,
pushed her towards the Kool-Aid dyed hair hapless stranger.
“Go this way,
go that way.
but I want you with me.”
She tried to whip up a moment,
catch him.
His mouth covered by strands of spinning hair.
He did not resist her,
but he did not lay it open.
No easy entrance,
so she wavered.
She never meant for her heart to surface,
to hit him with the magnetic plunk of fear,
and longing,
and illicit tosses under a wave of blue.
She fought it off,
tooth and nail,
trying to shave every hair off her body.
She tried to remain hopeless,
beyond touch and taste and desire.
He saw threw it,
threw her.
She never meant for him to see her,
the real her,
for anyone to see the real her.
He threw a rope out,
wide and sleek,
and it dangled off her hipbone,
made her feel luscious,
alive.
But she let it fall off her skin,
believing herself to not deserve that kind of life,
she closed the door.
she closed her legs,
she closed her soul.
She left him just outside the door,
the one she should have chosen,
thinking that she could never keep someone with such a beautiful soul.
He let her wear that hotel bathrobe.
He let her lean my back up against him,
never knowing that she faced away because she could not look at him straight on.
She closed her eyes wishing that the hand down her spine was someone else.
She let it be the wrong person.
Let her body intertwine with his,
let herself be pliable,
weak,
barely lucid.
He gave away something he had kept as his own,
that should not have been hers,
and watched her as she slept under the haze of a bottled up loss.
Wishes and manipulations trading places,
he spun around the voice in her,
sighing for her,
never noticing that she was losing her grip.
She kept asking him to give her a moment,
she kept struggling to breathe,
in and out.
She bit her lip until it bled,
chain smoked in the dividing line of in his room,
and out of his room.
She told him the outside lines of her story,
just the airbrushed magazine cover,
skipping the editorial,
and the “where to buy”.
He never bothered to turn a page,
flip it over,
read the fine print.
Lies began before her lips moved,
as she stood outside watching the sun set.
It was then she saw the other one walking by,
laundry folded in one arm,
cup of coffee in the other.
She opened her mouth to call to him,
but only a moth flew out,
silent,
vacant,
speechless,
nothing.
He handed her a towel,
a set of keys,
and four years.
Four years,
and the curve of his hands on her skin were still imprinted on her,
like pink finger print marks,
they are just an illusion she reminds herself,
just a memory.
She wipes them off every morning,
hiding them under cover-up and powder,
hoping he never sees.
Sweet Surrender :: Sarah McLachlan
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