No Images for Infinity
After Maureen Seaton’s “Planes Fly in Formation over My Backyard, As in War Movies”
Normally I would say there are no images for infinity, but today I am not so sure. There seem to be more doors down this hall then there were yesterday.
Yesterday, I was assured that I would eventually see the end of my life, but hanging between the doors is the same watercolor landscape.
The same watercolor landscape of a pond with white lotus flowers on the surface. The brush strokes seem mass produced here, when the artist’s touch should be singular.
It should be singular, but this hall only continues on and on, turning my home into a hotel, when all I wanted was for my space to be controlled.
It should be controlled so I could know that when the end comes, I’ll be able to walk down the hall one last time and imagine that I’ll be able to see the real pond.
I’ll see the real pond once I close my eyes for good, ready to grab a lotus with my hands and admire it for all eternity. But the hall keeps stretching further.
It stretches further, and I don’t know when I’ll find my true resting place here. Normally I would say there are no images for infinity, but today I am not so sure.
Dead to the Four Seasons
After Nicole Tallman’s “Spring”
I was pretty comfortable being dead to the four seasons. Watching the life cycle of the trees outside my window didn’t lead to inspiration.
Inspiration couldn’t come from watching seeds fall from the trees, nor did it come from watching a daisy brush the snow off itself come spring.
Come spring, I was in a relationship with a bottle of eyedrops, only allowing the polyethylene to make me feel lusty. I broke up with her for some SPF50 come summer.
Come summer, I spent my date nights dressing myself in blackout curtains and drinking bourbon iced teas while watching cop show reruns on TV.
On TV, I saw ads for back-to-school sales once autumn rolled around. It had been a long time since I opened myself up to trying different colored pencils.
Colored pencils froze and snapped if I picked them up once winter returned to crush daisies under snow-woven blankets. Then, I put my sketchbook away.
I put my sketchbook away because I knew I had found everything I could from nature, so I was pretty comfortable being dead to the four seasons.
A Body Shaped in this Earth
After Stefanie Kirby’s “Woman as Xeriscape”
A body shaped in this earth fractures without effort. A single acorn falling from the tree can break open the soil.
The soil breaks open as easily as the remains of an egg after its essence is spilled out across roots and weeds.
Roots and weeds can tear the body apart even further if the body gives them water and space to spread across.
They spread across the body and create pathways for ants to carry their bounty from the decay back to their kingdom.
The kingdom thanks the body for its fracture, for the blood that brought rainfall after a drought, for the hair that provided threading for the weavers.
The weavers make suit jackets, vests, and gowns as they celebrate the springtime prosperity, grateful for the body that sacrificed itself.
It sacrificed itself when it chose this tree as the place to die, for a body shaped in this earth fractures without effort.
Alex Carrigan (he/him) is a Pushcart-nominated editor, poet, and critic from Virginia. He is the author of May All Our Pain Be Champagne: A Collection of Real Housewives Twitter Poetry (Alien Buddha Press, 2022), and Now Let's Get Brunch: A Collection of RuPaul's Drag Race Twitter Poetry (Querencia Press, 2023). He has had fiction, poetry, and literary reviews published in Quail Bell Magazine, Lambda Literary Review, Barrelhouse, Sage Cigarettes (Best of the Net Nominee, 2023), Stories About Penises (Guts Publishing, 2019), and more. For more information, visit carriganak.wordpress.com or follow him on Twitter @carriganak.
Nicole Tallman's poem, "Spring", was published in BKR, here.