What will survive—the poem or I?

I am lost in my own distraction. I am afraid to read the words I write. I am afraid of their truth. This day is hot. The heat radiates from within and without. I watched the John Lennon film for Imagine. My god! That white room!  If I were to set foot in it I would cry uncontrollably.  I would curl into a fetal position and wish to be born again.

 

I want to be born again in that white room. It is inaccessible to me. If I were in that white room I would likely not be able to write. The white silence would be too great. The clean page would erase me. I would only be able to write of ennui and the flowers growing unkempt beyond the windows.

 

I am so far behind in my own education. I know only the tutelages of grief. I write about death in every poem. The death of self, of other, of love—something has changed. The vodka is kind. I watched the way you cut the lemon. I came home and mimicked your slicing—neat and precise. My limes were perfect over ice in a glass with vodka and juice. It’s time for another.

 

Thank you for breaking into the jail of me.

 

I want to open figuratively and literally. I want to crush the glass in my hand and let the blood and cold liquor leak through my fingers.  My nature demands the wakefulness of ineffable shock–

 

There is a river in me. Storms have come. The snows have melted. Let the floodgates open.  I want to flow to land, wipe away structures.

I am on a cross and I am scared.