Blocked/Unblocked
Blocked/Unblocked
Blocked
I can hear the movements of my muscles as my nails grip onto earwax
I can hear myself swallow, and the spiderweb of snot enclosing my nostrils.
I can notice the warmth of my legs against my ribcage, as I grip myself.
I can feel the ticklish kisses of my eyelashes against my squinting eyes. I cannot see, and I focus on the nothing, realising that the person in Philosophy who said that we’re the thing that looks at our eyelids could be right.
I can feel the moment my tears splash onto my glasses because of gravity and my bowed head, my every effort not to sob wasted because there’s a rising feeling coming from my gut that I have to trust is the result of an overwhelm and not the need to vomit. Though, the waist of my jeans is tight at this bent shape.
I picture the rushing blood in my earlobes, the veins that keep me alive. The spreading of fungus and bacterias in streaks of glorious hunger; the shapes of shells that were polished, just to dissolve in the stale corner air of an antique store.
Blocked, I can force myself to pretend that I am asleep, that I am not actively avoiding listening despite the deprivation of carried sounds. I can remind myself to be here, inside me and only here.
\
Unblocked,
My ears crackle into focus
There is no moment to hide it; only the jump to approaching footsteps.
Deal with sight, the grime of human excrement on glasses- what are they called? The leaking salt, the need for some proof of pain and response that isn’t habitual; oh wait, there’s supposed to be consent involved?
Sniffles, return breath to me, but more mismatched and wobbling than what I had repeated before. I flick earwax from under my nails and start plotting a poem to go with this, to go with the inevitable dose of round 2 that I’m never properly ready for. The chill returns to my fingers, and I grip the curves and folds of my hoodie. The nails dig in but my warming armour does its job; I’ve had plenty of practise hugging myself.
Blame. Blame. Shaking in one leg, is it muscle sores or is it tension (?) from the pianowire that’s slipping through the tenderness of my neck, until I confess that I don’t know, that I don’t care, until I stop listening because the sound of the la la las in my brain and mind is better than the voice who is yelling and forcing a defensive drumbeat, a rising crescendo. You might think the poet who is well-versed in predicting what will come would be able to handle it the thousandth time, that round 2 would instead be counted properly against the many years of doing the same thing, of retreating as a show of defeat, of tiredness. A running from the fight but then the fight follows to get the final, sniper’s shot and no blocked sound can stop it from hurting. No playlist of soft musics or pinching feeling in the waist saying the month has changed will stop it.
Maybe words are the only way to cope, but do they change anything, will they make it hurt any less or is it just as proof of self-healing wounds, of the woolen cloak the poet keeps warm and close, of the shedding that is no use, that lacks intention or clarity and instead spends its time waiting for a new kind of intimacy. Someone exciting with a contagious laugh that makes the world slow down. Never have I ever texted someone so often. Never have I ever felt hands rough like my dads, but willingly squeezed them first, even when it’s cold. Never have I ever wanted to curl up and confess, confess that something becomes easier to carry when there’s someone waiting to be thought of, to be reminded of with birds doing their daily laps around the city buzz, around the dappled light spreading from maple leaves to the stained glass of libraries. Never have I ever been so glad to miss a bus (accidentally, but maybe the Universe made it happen) because we got to spend a few more awkward minutes being real; and everything was alright.
Really want to crawl through the screen right now and cry. Really don’t want to be crying again to a sad song, alone. Really missing your voice as you teach me how to find my own way to walk, how you never judge me when I get tired and begin to avoid eye contact, because you also see the beauty in simple things like birds on a ledge together in an alleyway. I need you right now.
And that, is the world unblocked.
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