Biophilia

By Melissa M. Sharp

My mother,

a woman full of deep irrational ire and pain,

stands with my wedding dress,

cupped delicately in her quivering hands.

A bowed head, 

dark velvet curls shielding a crying collection of cascading tears, 

her hair is so painfully dark against the white hues of my dress.

She is a statue emitting grief in her perpetual silence.

She never moved from this stance, 

not really, not ever. 

A warrior will never cease their feud.

A fool will always choose to compromise. 

I am hollow and empty, watching her cry,

because there is a hole inside my stomach,

gaping and bleeding out, staining the carpet.

She hugs white satin and cream lace and pearls of snow,

but won’t embrace the life she created.

My skeleton is left in a pile in the corner.

She thinks it’s a sign,

that I lost something so dear and delicate,

a reason from God to not wed. She is glad.

And I am rising in fury,

my disgust seeping endlessly from my burning tongue,

that has screamed words only hell could possess.

According to the woman I no longer know,

who was supposed to love me for all of my years.

I am shoved out of my memories as squeaking squeals meet me in kindness.

My rats are my future.

‘Hello Marmalade, hello Jam.’ 

Their tails wrap around my ankles, reminding me that I am rooted to the Earth as the trees in the fields are. 

I raise my arms, pretending that I am the tree that talks, 

its greenery of questions and unheard answers flowing through my veins,

translated by the wind that kisses my ears. 

Whoosh, 

               whoosh, 

                               when?

Now.

My rats are giggling again, 

bouncing and leaping in euphoric anticipation, 

whiskers twitching at the idea of me, 

                            becoming her. 

I asked the tree this morning if this would happen. 

If ever, I could move differently to the woman who moved me, to fight the phantom hands that push and shove my limbs into the steps I don’t want to take because it’s her blood that flows in me, capsizes me from my boat of bones, drowning in the vermilion, maroon, red tears that swim through the outlines of my skin, the same skin that is stretched out on my forehead, that she wept onto the day that I was born. 

She wept onto my wedding dress that same way.

Don’t tell her I remember that though.

I don’t think she thinks I remember.

                                                                                  But I do.

I pick up my rats and place them back in their cages, filled with toys and treats.

They are my children, their lives my eternal bell that chimes when I wake and chimes when I sleep, never letting me forget I am without the essence of their souls.

Almost like a baby which could not sit inside the gaping hole of my stomach, showing only my bones as a trophy, I can carry.

My womb is not needed. 

I can’t remember where I put it.

Symphonies of birds have awoken me this morning,

different to the bells. Softer. 

Looking up, I find a tree shelters my presence, 

a veil of natural harmonies; these twigs interlock to hold hands whilst leaves stroke against green, orange, yellow, 

all alike in their structure but so vibrantly different in their shining colours. 

How did I get here?

Did sleep drag me from my bed,

cradling my sack of a body,

meandering away from the confinements of an unrecognisable home,

leaving me as a tribute to the Gods.

The morning sun peeks through the gaps above, 

tickling me in rays of joy, 

sprinkling all the way around my body,

hugging my aura ever so gently.

And I can’t help but smile.

But I jolt against this daydream,

as I realise now, a new presence is filling me up from the inside. 

My hands instinctively reach for the hole in my stomach,

and for once,

it has been filled up.

By soil, by mud, by grass, by blood.

I am not alone.

I want to tell Marmalade and Jam. 

But first,

I must find something that I lost so long ago,

when my first chance died along with my soul.

I was robbed of loving,

So, I robbed my body.

I think that’s how the cycle goes.

I have paid my wages not to suffer,

I’ll show you; I’ll be better than her.

Better than my mother.

And when I cry on your forehead in nine months,

I’ll bless you with my tears,

and I’ll make sure you never stand alone in that wedding dress,

For I will love you for all of my years.

By Melissa M. Sharp