YOU’VE COME UNDONE
There’s a bar top
where my feet danced
and vats of vodka
that my throat drank
and tons of men
my hips danced
against
and the cool devilish
calling of a fallen
world in the
crooks of my elbows
and swing of my hips
and never a day
goes by that I
don’t think about
the vodka,
the dancing,
the sweet smell
of smoke entering
a soul,
but that’s only
because I’m human.
That’s only because my
eyes see only
what’s in front of me
and not the quiet
God-like pull
numbing the canvas,
wiping it clean.
like a green olive tree
I don’t know a lot
about other women,
but are they twinned
in the mirror,
eyes combing through
every year this or that
just didn’t work out
but thoughtfully left
its initials under an eye?
The other day, I caught
my photo from years ago
and thought about You,
what it’s like to take in
such a magnificent creature
although, I admit, I have
no wings or a lion’s head
that might turn some heads.
But what about now, day
in, another day out,
my face still stuck to a piece
of glass, my face simultaneously
falling through cracked earth,
and a man still loving me,
calling me beautiful,
even though the voice
in my head rolls its eyes?
Can you love a little
lump of clay, crumbling
from time’s breath,
from the stubborn this’s
and that’s that all had
other plans?
Can you love a “me”
that no longer knows
where to look.
hearts carved from rock
There is
always
a
tiny version
of love
we give to
those we don’t
love.
A guilt-driven band-aid,
for all the times
your moments
together don’t
add
up.
And I don’t
want to do that to You
or to anyone
but sometimes I think
my heart is carved
too deep from the rock.
And I don’t think I can love
You
until I remember
You’re the one
who carved
it.
Ericka Clay is the author of Dear Hearts and Unkept. She is a former atheist turned Christian homeschooling mama. The pigs have apparently flown.
Heart of Flesh Literary Journal 