#saltsubmission

[poetinside]

Submissions Time!

I'm so excited to start reblogging these! If you don't see your submission today just be patient. It's going to take me a little while to get through them all. Thanks so much for participating guys! You're all mint chocolate chip cookies in my book. Love! J

[apostal]

Salt & Stone

He's got salt in his eyes,

His mouth,

His mind.

Stone hands won't rub it away

Because he can’t lift them;

They’re too heavy and so he let’s

The crystals bash around his mind

At night leaving skid marks on his brain.

It imprints-

It's stuck,

it's glued

Behind his eyelids and sometimes it burns

Too much to close his eyes, but they’re like bricks

So all at once his body turns into a battle field

And he loses every time, no matter what.

And he remembers when the monsters were only under his bed.

But Daddy can’t make these monsters go away;

Mommy can’t kiss the salt goodbye.

It’s stuck.

It’s glued,

And it burns his dreams like a

Fireball that’s right by his face-

He can smell his hair singe.

So despite the cup of water beside his bed,

And despite the pills and the doctors

He can’t get rid of the salt because

It’s stuck.

It’s glued

And it makes him worry that it’s all he’ll

Ever see,

Ever taste

Because nothing is working

To cure his stone limbs,

And his body isn’t an ocean whose waves will erode

The pain away so he can sleep at night without salt

Encrusted eyes and a bitter taste in his mouth.

He can’t even be bothered to move himself.

It’s too hard to walk with rocks in his pockets.

And that’s why Johnny left him, but before he did

He said that you can catch more flies with honey,

But vinegar is all he’s got,

Along with salt and stones that burn and sink him.

Now, he’s just hoping he’ll sink so low that he comes

Out the other side and things will be different.

[obscureexplanations]

The salt of your tears, preserved only the harsh, memories I had of you.

[nessalong]

Salt

I want to write about the last time we were drunk, and I started to kiss your shoulder. You moved away quickly back onto his lap, but for the rest of the night, I licked and licked my lips, and I could not stop. Something about the salt on your skin is poetry, but I’m not sure what.

[nothidingjustgrowing]

Nothing stings more, not even dashing salt into an open wound, than the sound your door made when you slammed it and forgot to say goodbye.

[poetinside]

You are that word that escapes me You are at the tip of my tongue I can taste the salty elusiveness Of you

[sheddingletters]

tremors

i.

I used to watch my mother's hands shake  while she cooked, measuring the salt, stirring spices. I've always wanted to help and never known how.

ii.

the woman manicuring my nails shakes her head

forces my finger still tells me to relax take a deep breath calm down relax relax why can't you relax?

I wonder if she's ever been helpless because she couldn't do something as ordinary as breathing. (I hope not)

iii.

last week, I came home to broken plates on the floor and my mother's hands still trembling and her eyes, the same ones I see every day reflected in the mirror, unable to look at me.

iv.

now, while I add in spices, stir in deliberate motions she sits, hands clasped (and still, they refuse to steady themselves the same as mine).

[poetinside]

The One Who Fed Me

The first time I saw her she was sitting in a corner booth at one of those tacky retro diners around campus. It was a cheap chain with red pleather seats and waitresses in bubblegum pink jumpsuits. It was packed with students, all wired from too many adderall-fueled all nighters. She was sitting with a dazed expression behind a mountain of books. I thought at first she was looking at me but I realized she was just staring blindly in my general direction. I doubted she could even hear the noise from the tinny speaker right above her head. I longed to know what she was thinking. The only time I ever looked that focused was when rolling a joint. I got up and walked towards her with exaggerated distraction, pretending to make a beeline for the bathroom. As I passed her table I saw the books were all in Greek. A few grains of salt were stuck to the side of her cheek as if she had fallen asleep on the table. I had to fight the urge to lick them off her face; to kiss her with a salty tongue and take her right there on Aristotle’s likeness. I felt a familiar stirring below my waste and hurried to the bathroom before anyone would notice. By the time I reemerged, calmed by cold water to my temples, she was gone. It was months before I saw her again. It was summer by then. School had been out for awhile and everyone was in that August craze, the sun was at its hottest and September loomed too close on the horizon. It was a Wednesday and I hadn’t slept since the Thursday last. I was determined to get back to some semblance of normalcy so I pottered around my apartment throwing out beer bottles and blunt wrappers. I checked the balance on my account and hoped that what I hadn’t blown on eight balls and booze would be enough to buy some cigarettes, bread and eggs. I stumbled to the corner store. I hadn’t showered in days and I reeked. So of course she was there. I hovered by the milk and leered like a total creep. She saw me. I blanched. She smiled. I nearly dropped my eggs. I did what any guy would do in that situation: got the fuck out of dodge. But she wasn’t having that. She caught up with me by the checkout and touched my elbow gently. I felt my pulse slow to a crawl beneath her touch and my ears began to ring so loud I felt sure I would pass out. But I kept it together. So you’re stalking me? She said it playfully, teasing. I mumbled something vaguely coherent that I can’t even remember. She told me she saw me at the diner. And at the cooler party a few weeks later. My head was spinning. I had been high off my ass that night. I told her so. She laughed. I remember. You were dancing with my roommate. She wanted to take you home with her but you ended up passing out in a bush. That’s my signature move. Oh yeah? It didn’t work that time. That’s too bad. Not really. I would have been pretty jealous if you guys had got together. She didn’t say it like most girls would. There was no flirtatiousness in her voice. It was deep and hollow like corral and it echoed in my ears. She wanted me. ME. And she wanted me to know it. Come have lunch with me. Let me cook you lunch. You look hungry. She said it firmly and I knew it wasn’t a question. It wasn’t sexual either. She wanted to feed me. She wanted to make me whole. I knew all this just from the way she looked me up and down when she said it. I knew I was fucked, then. I knew then she had me on a string and there was no going back. We walked to her place in silence. I noticed everything about her. She had three holes in each ear but no earrings. She had a small tattoo behind her right ear but she tried to hide it with her hair. Her hair was a strange length, like it had been cut very short but was starting to grow. She had great hands that swung around a lot when she walked. She bit only her thumbnails and they were chewed raw around the edges. We got to her place and I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw it was empty. She unpacked her groceries and began to cook right away while I hovered awkwardly in the tiny living room. The place was sparsely furnished and everything was Ikea plastic. The walls were light blue and the curtains were a pale yellow. I knew instinctively that nothing was hers. Right on cue she turned to me. I’m not planning to stay long. I couldn’t be bothered to put any real effort into the decorating. Where are you going? I want to go to Cephalonia. Like in that book… Captain Correli’s Mandolin. Right! I read that in high school. It’s my favourite. So you’re Greek? Nope. Then why there? I just really like the book.

Do you speak it? I’m learning.

I remembered the Greek texts at the diner. I remember thinking I never cared enough about any class to be so exhausted by it. I realized how different it must be when you actually want to know about the things you are being taught.

I watched her cook. Her bare legs were a great colour, like that one I always used to use to paint pots in art class in high school, burnt umber. She spilled a bit of salt and threw it over her shoulder like my mum used to. My hands slipped around her waist of their own volition and it was only when I felt her stiffen beneath them did I realize I was holding her. I’m leaving. You can have me as much as you want me for now. But I am leaving. And you can’t come with me. This is my story. I was too distracted by her smell to even really acknowledge her words. Her breathing shortened and she opened beneath my fingers, first her mouth, then her knees bit by bit. Her back arched and I felt her press against me. We both swayed and I had to hold on to the counter top to stop from falling. I remember her fingers tasted like tomatoes and I smelled like garlic for days after. I remember she lay on her stomach afterwards and tried to teach me how to count in Greek while I watched the light from the window slice diagonal across her spine. We ate sandwiches on her floor and didn’t put clothes on til nightfall. She was childlike and ancient all at once. She was superstitious. She was romantic. She was moving across the world because of a book. But she was cold too at times. Some questions she wouldn’t answer and she would wound me with long silences. For five hours I was at her mercy. I longed to please her. To make her laugh. To make her cum. To make her stay. She didn’t of course. They never do, the ones with their stories already written.