HORRIFIC CONFECTION by Juliet Cook - BlazeVOX
HORRIFIC CONFECTION by Juliet Cook - BlazeVOX
HORRIFIC CONFECTION by Juliet Cook - BlazeVOX
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
Relativity<br />
He pushes me too high to jump;<br />
plays tricks with my equilibrium.<br />
A sleight of hands behind the back<br />
conjures me into a rubbery flux.<br />
Rusty chains stain my skin with imprints<br />
the hue of metallic plums. Dark, shiny bruises<br />
that hint of past plummets; ominous impacts<br />
I desired to leave. A mysterious trail<br />
--damaged fruit and peculiar loot.<br />
I wanted to be some kind of freaky meteorite<br />
shooting shards of sharpened debris. Like gleaming spikes<br />
and bolts I unearthed beside the railroad tracks;<br />
added to my beveled candy dish. A shrine<br />
to inedibility, inaccessibility, inscrutability. Instead,<br />
I just get smaller as my velocity increases. I’m the incorrect<br />
kind of anomaly. Misfit. Bad seed. My wrists could be slit<br />
with a child-sized scissor blade and I would quickly ebb<br />
into the faintest pulse, the tiniest glimmer,<br />
dead star, elapsed arc, insignificant<br />
handful of ellipses…<br />
A relapse of unease re:<br />
inanimate objects can be sinister. Sometimes,<br />
I hear them hissing. With cold metal logic,<br />
he explained to me his reality<br />
in which the tire swing didn’t even know<br />
my head was entwined with its coarse rope.<br />
It just kept spinning; reeling out reams<br />
of my long, soft hair like it was a wig.<br />
I was an oblivious princess, a dense doll,<br />
an inanimate object in thrall of burning black rubber<br />
and then I was bald. They could see the seam<br />
atop my skull. Crack me open like a plastic egg<br />
and extract the dark scarves. Another flimsy trick<br />
any playground magician could master. Hacked<br />
hair may grow back. Star anise may distract from the reeking<br />
wreaked havoc of melted rubber and rotten fruit<br />
trajectories, but my split ends are hissing again;<br />
hinting at severed connections. Tattered tapestry, warped grip,<br />
intertwined links he could hoodwink into a choke chain.<br />
19