Self-Portrait in a Dream
Again, the author of the music is the antelope
breathing at the end of a gun—sometimes, I am the child
caught by fire. In the end, the barn is on fire. But isn’t the father’s
dream to bring home the antelope, still alive, breathing but almost breathless—and
everyone gathered by the small light of night, sharing grace over the meat stew? Grief is not
foreign to me. My grandmother’s body, exiled by stroke, laid in the coffin as the undertakers
gave dust to dust—as my crying father swept sand into the grave, his arm ambled over the
holiness of her silence. In the still sky, city lights prey upon rodents. Again, the antelope
in that dream at the end of a gun—at the end of its life, a bullet forgets itself in its
jugular veins—like me, when I took the blade and cut my wrist in search of flowers,
knocking at a door I was not ready for, telling the shadow to leak itself through the window, saying
“Leave me, and let me go.” In a dream, I tell the trees about the brevity of goodbyes, of
music the leaves make when the wind returns from war—and I walk the distance with a stranger’s
name tugging my tongue out of place. Out of place, the bones of my grandmother’s regret.
breathing at the end of a gun—sometimes, I am the child
caught by fire. In the end, the barn is on fire. But isn’t the father’s
dream to bring home the antelope, still alive, breathing but almost breathless—and
everyone gathered by the small light of night, sharing grace over the meat stew? Grief is not
foreign to me. My grandmother’s body, exiled by stroke, laid in the coffin as the undertakers
gave dust to dust—as my crying father swept sand into the grave, his arm ambled over the
holiness of her silence. In the still sky, city lights prey upon rodents. Again, the antelope
in that dream at the end of a gun—at the end of its life, a bullet forgets itself in its
jugular veins—like me, when I took the blade and cut my wrist in search of flowers,
knocking at a door I was not ready for, telling the shadow to leak itself through the window, saying
“Leave me, and let me go.” In a dream, I tell the trees about the brevity of goodbyes, of
music the leaves make when the wind returns from war—and I walk the distance with a stranger’s
name tugging my tongue out of place. Out of place, the bones of my grandmother’s regret.
