spring: (v) |spraNG| |sprəNG|

SPRING: ( to move or jump suddenly or rapidly upward or forward: spring 2  I sprang out of bed | figurative : they sprang to her defense. • move rapidly or suddenly from a constrained position by or as if by the action of a spring…..)

There is something to be said about sweeping Winter away in order to make room for the births.

Three months of trees practicing their nudist pose. Branches growing skinny from shiver. Humans housing all the layers they own from hoarded cotton, wool and synthetic threads.

Soon, we can remain outside longer than just to get from one building to another. Soon, we can dust off picnic baskets and unfold tank tops. Soon, we can remember what it is like to sweat because the sun is squeezing its gaze against your bare shoulders.

day 23: vitamins

These days have begun to stretch. They have begun to expand as though new bones have sewed themselves to the sun, dangling like elongated bells, alerting us that after all this grey shiver, there will be warmth again.

The humans grow more fur to keep themselves warm. They cover themselves in wool and thermal in order to combat the winter freeze.

Recently, I have been advised to ingest more Vitamin D. The sun grows shy in the winter, or perhaps this season permits the sun to go on holiday. It exists, but in far less moments. Gunmetal grey and taupe grey and cadet grey and silver replace cornflower blue and tufts blue and cerulean blue and azure.

When the sun arrives, my friend tells me, walk outside. Even if it is so cold your fingers forget how to curl. Leave your sunglasses behind [I don’t own any] and allow your corneas to inhale the vitamins. On days when the sun forgets to wake, you must take Vitamin D.”

But must I take a pill? I query. Ar there foods I can eat, which are full of this?

We are all vitamins, she insists. We are made up of all sorts of chemicals. Outside, the sun is best, but sometimes you need to swallow what your body craves, even if it is difficult to digest.

you can call this rain and I will title it Brooklyn’s bathtime

It happens like an unexpected tap on shoulder. You are walking or riding your bike. You are engaging with the outdoors in some way. Perhaps your jacket is unzipped. You left your scarf at home. If you are wearing a hat, it is only because your hair got lost and has been traveling in opposite directions, not to keep your scalp warm. You are lost in the language of clouds that you are either humming toward or meditating with.

You feel a drop. Maybe two. It’s Brooklyn, so that drop could be the wind pushing someone else’s spit against you or a pigeon excreting its breakfast onto you.

Then the drops turn into many and more and faster and harder and there are no more individual clouds. You look up and the sky has unzipped just like your jacket. You are about to turn mad until you realize how beautiful all this is.

This rain becomes your lover for the afternoon, showering your skin with so many kisses, that you grow giddy. Your clothes become a new layer of flesh. You skip, splashing in puddles, pick up leaves that bathe in this spring moisture. Your bones want to push out from beneath its protective layer and play along. This is when you start to dance. Maybe sing. Definitely holler toward the peeking moon.

In the summer, all of this will get even louder and hotter and this free bath will be even better.

For now, this is spring and this rain is meant to wash winter’s footprints away. It is meant to summon the flowers, planted months earlier. Reawaken the trees and hibernating animals and humans.

 

condemn winter and the inability to get inside this cold

“The music is like a passport and how to make a donut so lonely it forgets its fried birth and your fingers may find mine like a fixed-gear contraption but Saturday is a mourning of leftovers and–”

I’m leaving you.

“Your feet are curdled, crossed at ankles and I like that my tongue memorized your teeth ridges but here in Brooklyn, an audience of newspapers and muffin crumbs touch us with their blinks, skimming the salt drips on my face.”

Your temperature is hungry and I am without.

“What can friends become once limbs grow like mattresses and sleep stretches into inter-locked dreams but you’ve    …     you’ve–”

Insomniac’d and sleep walked on fire escapes just to–

“Escape recycled napkins splintering my face and all these tears happen because of your puncture…this Spring is scratched and wretched from the translation of your spit gone dry for me.”

Let’s stage a puncture.

“I climbed billboards to see your point of view and then I jumped.”

The shadow of your blood echoes against my ribcage.

“My sadness is contagious to the ones who listen but you are immune.”

How about we grow our wrists until August to see what shapes we become and compare.

“Or we can tie our organs to each other because tangling so often leads to–”

Amputation.

create a tunnel with body & excavate & root

Fur from underground tells us to remove our wool, our zippered necks, our hibernation. Ignore the ice seizured from the sky. Pretend not to see the purple clouds, twitching out poor circulation.

This is Spring.

Notice the root vegetables. The twirl of wheels against iron between bodies called bike ride. Notice the drip of petals falling then flying across city blocks. Notice exposure of ankles and slippery shoulders.

The roots are just toes pressing in to the autumn and cold that hide not so far beneath. Keep your fleece away. The night still shivers but pretend it into a whisper. There is green out there and it peeks out from the grey. Tulips like turmeric can aid away the wounds of winter. Call out the goose bumps on forearm as inspired breaths. The moon awaits your nude.

an observance of winter along the inseam of two bodies

“Tell me again what it is like,” she said with eyes like Pluto: distant, cold, removed.

“Kind of like what I imagine Winter to be. My limbs were icicles buried into her. Enough time pressed against each other and there was melt. We remained on her wet sheets, which reminded me more of Spring because they were romantically yellow.”

“But. But tell me what shivered. Tell me about frostbite. Don’t pretend pain did not exist just because parts of you disappeared.”

“How about this. There is something magnificent about understanding the strength of my skin when it exists against another. Her tongue proposed marriage inside me.”

“You don’t believe in that, I thought.”

“Belief is like religion. Sometimes it just happens on holidays. Every other day I am an atheist, but when our bodies are making Winter, I am reverent.”

far away is where leaves may be found and they are musical.

New York is familiar now. I recognize corners and smells. My favorite still: west fourth street or grand army plaza on Saturday. And the scent of halal trucks stirring up the hunger in my belly.

New York is not exactly home, but it is where my mail can be received and it is where I write poetry and it is where love can be found and harm and passion and overwhelm and museum and music and memory and there is still new to be found there is still new to be found here.

New York is where I fell once, split open my chin and received nine stitches. New York is where I fell in love and fell out of love and fell in love again (and the pattern continues). New York is where I picnic and nap outside on patches of grass (where it grows) and study the moon at night.

But sometimes. Sometimes one must leave in order to remember that maybe it is more home than one is willing to admit.

***

Far away is where leaves may be found and they are musical.

Or perhaps right now, they look a bit more like this:

I do not have to travel very far to find this musical instrument beneath my feet. So, I dance above them and listen to their harmony. And if I’m in the right mood, I push myself on top of them and roll against their hardened veins and faded colors and smell Winter fumes seeping out.

When I travel, I notice the sounds all around me. In New York, honking and sirens and reveling and buses stopping and starting again and children and and

In the country, or where homes are bigger and transportation is above ground, I hear crickets and various multi-colored birds flapping their wings and tire wheels slushing against wet ground. I hear my father. I hear peace.

New York Brooklyn may be the love of my life: one that accepts my weight gain or moodiness, my mismatched outfits, my hairy legs, and my anxieties. But it is still necessary to go away sometimes to remember how good it feels to miss it.

Far away from Brooklyn, I’m listening to music. A band of leaves tapping against my window. Tree branch. Howl of wind. I’m having an affair (pre-approved) because New York and I are polyamorous. This state slows me down. Removes my schedules and routines. I am younger here and that’s ok sometimes.

weighting room

Winter brings on various changes:

The weight of air grows heavy against skin. There is a challenge to skin’s texture. Pushes out the old, wants it to flake off in dry patches like the leaves falling away from the trees. Lotion may be used in copious quantities.

The cold causes closets to appear bare at times when all articles of clothing are worn at once. Base layer of tank top or cotton undershirt. Long sleeved something beneath sweater. Three scarves around neck twirled together like competing dancers. Two corduroy jackets beneath thicker one. Long underwear–a bit itchy at times–beneath pants held tighter to thighs by leg warmers. Two pairs of socks–one long and one short. Boots. Gloves. Hat.

Body is protected in many ways. By clothing and by…more body.

I am trying to get used to this new shape. My Winter shape. If this were mathematics class, I might refer to my body as the Mandelbrot Set: an extremly complex object which shows a new structure at all magnifications. I am bigger. Perhaps this is my way of hibernating inside my self. There are no arms exposed or hips peeking out from thin shirts. My legs nap beneath layers of pants. If I were the type of person to shave my legs, I would stop at this time. I feel my face growing from oval to heart shaped. My hour glass is filling in with sand and I feel boxier and broader.

Buttons plunge and attempt a run-away from fabric. Belts are not as necessary. Winter is filling me out and weighing me down.

Now, although there are moments of overwhelm and frustration, this is not about wanting out of this body. (There is a sense of wanting out but it is not connected to this)

When I look at humans, I notice their shape. I love the various ways in which bodies arrive at themselves. We are multiple choice answers, filled in with scribbles and overflow. This is good. This is real. In the summer, I am bonier but never skinny or thin or small. How wonderful to be like the leaves, changing with season.

So, I remain a little longer studying my nudity. Grab hold of my belly that is far more rebellious than its ever been. There is no six-pack or three-pack or one-pack. It is wavy and loose. But it is still mine.

My thighs speak out like rioting teenagers. They are strong beneath the fat and move a little longer than I do. Cellulite illuminates and it can sometimes be a struggle to feel empowered by these persistent dimples, but they are mine too.

There is more to touch and notice and I still want to be noticed.

Winter, I will do my best not to get angry at your bone-chilling air. I will search out ways to extinguish any insecurities I have with this expanding body, growing in order to create more warmth. I will become bilingual off this body, as it starts a new language: one with clicks and whistles and hard to reach syllabic slurs. Beautiful does not have to be limited to small things, to smooth things, to sculpted angles of skinny. Beauty can be illuminated through folds and twists and turns and who knows how this body will end? It is unpredictable, which is far more exciting. Don’t you think?