by Bethany Tap
I could say your lips are fish hooks.
I could say you’re the Earth and I’m the moon.
I could say that sometimes I float
above us and we are the color
of maple leaves against a sunless October sky
and when someone says your skin is a pale shell
give them your wrist, tell them
to listen for the sea running through your veins.
When others take you up like clay to mold,
turn, examine, beat and burn,
tell them:
I am the laughter that bubbles
and bursts from deep secret waters. I am
the hand that will reach
across an empty beach. I am
the vertigo felt staring
up at the night. I am
the stars the night the fog of breath
and the bite of cold on fingertips.
Tell them: I am.
(Of course, people will always try to tell you
who you should be,
who you are.
I am no exception.)
Here is one truth, right now:
your body hooked against me like a comma,
a pause,
here
where no one can say otherwise.
Bethany Tap received her MFA in creative writing from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in Sleet Magazine, Chautauqua, Flash Fiction Magazine, ballast, and The MacGuffin, among others. She lives in Grand Rapids, Michigan with her wife and four kids.
Emerge Literary Journal 