i.
yesterday you were sleeping on the red rug behind the couch just before dinner. gillian was calling us upstairs, so i guess i took it upon myself to wake you up-- you were curled into yourself with your head on a pink beanbag, and i couldn’t find it in myself to break the silence. the curvature of your waist was rising and lengthening, disguising white ribs and a spaghetti sauce heart and two lungs like great balloons. you were wearing this blue plaid flannel that struck against the clean 6 oclock glow of your flying buttress cheekbones; your overarching eyebrows, like gothic domes, hug the fullness of your skin. I hold you in the palm of my hand, a porcelain figure that would shatter into dust if i let you slip between my fingers.
ii.
your hands were nestled into each other like baby birds, and your knees were bent as if you knew even in sleep, to protect your vital organs. anyway, i think you had forgotten that your own heart was beating but i could see it thrumming just then-- like a canned tomato that God breathed stop-motion animation into. at that moment, there was this great clear wall between you and me and the harshness of waking. i didn’t want to be the one to remind you that your heart was still beating, and frankly i didn’t think i could. you were benjamin button cradled in the womb, nestled in a cavity of fluid, an amniotic sac of alone.
the warmth from your skin was so visible-- and for a second, it was clear to me that a body is a body is just a thing filled with other things.
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