Sojourn to Invisibility. {Poetry}

 

By J. Wilson Parrish

Its inception was insidious,

this fading into nothingness when

even the inner lights began to flicker and dim.

The core of my hypervigilance

gave the inner shield its weight.

Hide and she won’t find you,

it whispered .

She always found me.

There were times when my light was strong enough to transfigure the shield into a

drape

that would unravel during those brief moments

of sunlight and safety.

I was allowed to breathe,

and briefly,

to believe.

My light

sizzled and

strengthened,

as the weakening beam

of my suffering was released

to play among the dust motes.

I watched as they danced together before those tall, gothic,

light-filled windows,

The smells of ink, leather bindings and glue were the sentinels

for my grief and fear.

There was no permanent hiding place real or imagined,

save between the pages of the books, the stacks of

that great library,

my fear and shame were filed within the cards of that Dewey Decimal System.

My heart knew it as nonfiction but

it was too often sealed in the minds of the others

as a perma-fiction file.

It never mattered that that particular file name could not exist,

such was my reality for I could not either, not really.

The sentinels were always broached and

we would begin again, she and I.

This repetition fused the fear to my flesh

and its fibers melted into my bones

and my fading was resumed.

For a time,

my face remained discernible if one

were to closely look,

but they rarely did.

Their belief was suspended in accolades of

community service and floated

within the tepid depths of the charitable tea.

Such a marvel of patience

with such a clumsy, clumsy little girl!

Their words and insinuation hung limp

against the broken bones and broken heart

within the slowly fading light.

These days

I find myself moving in and out of

my fractured existence like

a mechanical cat,

demanding of attention but remote in my need.

My light has continued to flicker and dim,

at times extinguished

within the darkness of self-doubt and loathing.

But there are other rare days when the pen in my hand or the smell of the ink will incite

that electrical pulse and shiver,

and I can feel it racing and sparking along my conduits in hope

of ignition.

I wait and watch,

I bat the words about and

tangle the sentences across the page like string.

I listen for the static to hiss and clear,

watching for the turn of a head as the clarity and strength of my voice reaches

just one solid ear,

for the mechanics to finally whir and hum with connection

and recognition.

I feel the bumps and the shoves of them as

they weave around me and through me and over me,

unfeeling,

blind and deaf to my presence.

I arch my back and stretch and circle,

settling in to my patch of sun,

warm as I watch the dust motes continue their dance

within my invisibility.

Article was published here originally on Rebelle Society.

 

J. Wilson Parrish is a writer and a poet, a collector of books, and an artist who paints in flowers and cookie dough. She lives in Michigan with her two daughters and an assortment of rescued animals.

 

 

Photo: 3347654/tumblr

Editor: Dana Gornall

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