Like dirt
by Kate Shannon
fade in
ext. forest – uncertain time, for lack of
everything else and the sun
nowhere. present.
but not there, okay?
a thicket of tall trees is not seen but perhaps was, once. green grass, tall, too,
if I remember it right. describe it for me,
and the sun.
this is what I want you to see:
leaves falling because it is too late for them not to
leaves which catch fire and make shapes of the wind
shapes: the face the mountain the moon the distance of voices through tree a loose marrow bubbling on the water’s bloated surface.
now you see:
a woman, an all-purpose grave because that is what women so languishing become
a woman who loved you, the sun, and the apple-sweet valley so hard she became bones, here bones: the shape in your shaking hand the grass that grows through the hysterical lament
a loose tooth pried from the mouth too early, the hole its root leaves.
now this happens:
a woman, so sweet she might be mistaken for pure honey because that’s all sweet ought be a woman who loved back until woman became grave and still loved, just harder,
harder: the face the voice the hand bones between that I swear fit so good
a pond that is emptying too fast leaving boats on parched water.
fade out
int. a home that, despite everything, is still standing – morning
the sun pours itself over the
peeling wallpaper.
an apple-sweet valley. present.
but not in any meaningful way, woman-shaped honey crystallized
and never set out for warming.
a living room that smells sickly of peonies is seen, the rug a floral-stomped invocation
of feet that danced so close it still stinks of
yearning. describe it for me, and the sun.
