Hey Magnolias

This is more of a prose poem/ very short story. It's the first thing I'm sharing here, and I'm not really sure how this place works, so I thought I would start out short.

Hey magnolias. The rain looks wet but I guess your petals are waxy-smooth enough that the drops slide off before you turn prunish like my feet do walking home barefoot through puddles.

 

Out the window, I watch as the green floods up to the level of the branches on the big old trees. Invasions of canoers and rowboaters coast in past the flotsam and jetsam of university, their paddles dipping lazily, creating ripples that push the fallen magnolia blooms toward my window. Lap, lap, lap. Waves tap on the glass. Did you know that there is a difference between flotsam and jetsam? Flotsam are the things that go overboard accidentally; jetsam are the things we lose on purpose.

 

From the other side of the glass, I witness the flood. I'm glad for this quiet cup of black coffee moment, although lately, all I can think about is going under. I miss the roaring absolution, the tangible dark cocoon, the feel of a full body embrace that moves with me. I miss being a wet sack of blood and bones pushing up against ocean, lake, on all sides, hearing the warm whooshing roaring in my ears.

 

He thinks I am okay now, and I should be. I am okay except for sometimes I have too much going on inside of me and I need to make myself a little lighter. Jettison my jetsam. Otherwise, there's no way to go except down.

 

Hey magnolias. No one knows whether you can weather the storm until it's over. And from a distance, who can say if any one of you has all her petals? From far away, you’re all the same, white and purple and waxy and glistening in the rain. It’s only when you get close that you can see the bruises like broken ribs, like bloodstains, like memories of places we’ve been but don’t want to remember.

 

He thinks I'm swimming now, but today I think I'm not really swimming. I think what I'm doing is shedding my wet clothes and letting them sink to keep from drowning. First my shoes, then my coat, pants, shirt, bra, underwear. Me?

 

The loneliest moments come when I cry at night in our bed. I cry so quietly that you can’t hear despite your encircling arms and your lips sweetly pressed against my hair. You never feel my body stiffen with the strain of my quiet sobs. Why can’t you realize that all my cracks are on the inside?

 

I know what it looks like to watch myself drowning. Eerie, peaceful, the numbness is the strangest part of all. The surface of the water seals silently, finally, over the top of my head and I watch as my mind drifts away and my body drifts down, down, down into the dark.

 

When you sink that far under, it's not like swimming. The darkness is not from eyes closed. It's dark because there is no light. My eyes are open empty. Unseen currents swim through my hair and it fans out around my face. Your fingers in my hair feel the same way that the water does. How can two things so different both feel like home? In the dark the utter absolution is quiet. There is no roaring in my ears that have ceased to hear.

 

A lake and a puddle, I have noticed, can create the same reflection of mountains. After the rowboats have glided away the surface of the water is glass smooth. Only the floating magnolias, whose stems dangle below, know the water's depth. But they are content to drift in bruised silence, until they too become waterlogged and sink out of sight.

Author's Note

I want to know how this seems to others. I wrote this to capture a mood, and I want to know what the mood is that comes across to others, and whether it resonates with you or just annoys you.

Reviews

Kind of sad really. I like the detail and imagery in this. It is very well written.

[Vaidehi]

Has a very quiet mood to it. Interesting question there, whether it resonates or annoys - it does both. I would say it's a contradictory poem.. calming AND disturbing at the same time.