by
Or we were in the middle of an ocean, our legs losing strength. We were sea-sick in each other's laps, the pitch and roll of this faux love. We could no longer steady ourselves. We were in my bed, you imagining stars: I see through the ceiling, into the sky, where it is black and the stars are shining you said. I pretended half-sleep. If it was an ocean then we were a boat, holding each other's bodies in the shape of a raft, floating on our own limbs.
I want the baby in you. I want the baby in you to be our baby. I want the baby crawling across the floor. I want to decorate our walls. I want to vacuum up the dried moments we cannot stop spilling. I want the baby strapped to my back, making plans for plans. I want to have the baby. I want the baby crossed to my chest, asking you to marry me, the baby growing upwards. I want to measure her height on a door's trim. I want the baby that is inside of you, cooing. A baby, this baby, I want it to be ours, to show her how I make the sun set. This is not too much to ask.
When I opened up to speak, a ramble of words and a mountain came sliding towards us. Where do I put this? I was asking of myself, with no answers. You bled a leak that ran into the flooring. I was down on my knees toweling, knowing there was only a hollow of sky where her body had been. What color hair will she have? I was asking. What color eyes? There were rivers on our shelves. How big will her hands be? Then I had no more questions, and we were faded. I thought I saw a bird that was her when she was still possible, but it was water coming down, falling into these woods, and I was no longer on fire.
Copyright©2011 J. A. Tyler
J. A. Tyler is founding editor of Mud Luscious Press and author of Inconceivable Wilson (Scrambler Books) as well as the forthcoming A Man of Glass & All the Ways We Have Failed (Fugue State Press) and, with John Dermot Woods, the image text novel No One Told Me I Would Disappear (Jaded Ibis Press). For more, visit: www.mudlusciouspress.com.