I was 21 when I learned how to hold the fear in my abdomen, small and cold like a river-stone in my diaphragm.
I learned to feel it there between each breath, and still be able to use my hands
To load boxes and pass out flashlights, and hold an umbrella between myself and police officers in riot gear with handlebar mustaches.
It is a privilege that I didn’t have to learn sooner.
I was 22 when I learned how to shoot a gun. I thought I would cry
But I did not.
However my hands shook uncontrollably as I pressed each brass bullet into the magazine
And as I raised the weapon to shoot
At the gray, paper silhouette on newsprint before me,
Of which I had chosen the vaguest human form possible.
The only thing that has been honest enough to tell myself
Has been to remind myself that I am still breathing.
“I am still breathing.”
It’s not true to say that I’m safe, or to say that it’s ok.
I was 20 when a small lesbian drew a star on my chest
Just over my heart
With an inked needle that did not draw blood.
I lay on a padded table next to the kitchen, and I didn’t feel very much of the pain.
That was because some of my nerves still hadn’t grown back in under my skin,
Like mycelium.
I’ve been captivated by two things on my short walk home between the bus stop and my door:
There is a sycamore tree that has lost most of its leaves
And its vacant branches reach into the sky like black, interlocking fishbones
Or skeletal hands,
Once the gray twilight reaches their fingers.
On the ground, a few meters before it, is a bush of white flowers.
Every time I pass it, I think Oh how they must glow at night
So pale and bright under the light of the moon.
Maybe to live is to sing a love song into a strong wind
And lose your words to it forever.
E. Falter 5/28/25