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Sarah Lilius
Becoming
Biceps as wheels of the frame, strange and revolting, meat for cannibals or bears after the
winter. They leave the cave one paw at a time, they find no sun against dingy fur. I
cannot describe the fear mixed with calm about your biceps, about bears leaving caves.
Moments of nature I could cut open with a spear if I was a hunter. I gather and it's
absurd. Processed food and new sneakers. We often look for pools of chemical water but
only in the summer. I want to see the forest again before I die. To look nothing in the gut,
to find berries but not eat them because I've learned. Deep in the woods there's no gravel
driveways, no lawns with plastic animals, or strange men rubbing themselves on
sidewalks. I find grass to sleep on. Mother bear and her cubs sniff me, claw at my body, I
am a body. Finally.
Zen Happens
I can't find the right Japanese words drumming slowly in my veins, sleeping lazily on
hard rafts, the blood thick water with flutes floating by, not cells, they've been blown
away from the sound. I didn't realize the smells from the intimate incense were in your
dark hair. We should starve in here to see how that goes. The waving cat drives me mad.
Let's get the blood on our bodies, necessary, like sun, like thoughts. I'm a mother inside
your easy ways. I'm clean outside this path. The wise one doesn't always visit on
Tuesdays. It's better to find the answers by oneself. Your bones and skin are useless
myths. Write this down.
Hearing Pearl Jam's Ten for the 115th Time
We like the way this mixes us inside like germination, outside like spackling paste, messy
perfect white. When curfew hits, an oak tree falls in our path. We didn't even notice the
lightning until it was gone. The flash mistaken for a distant miracle. In the dark we fall,
face to concrete, flesh to brick. Lilacs die from our stench.
I talk music with boys. The slightly cute ones with flannel or black everything, Chucks
drawn on with Bic pens or Dr. Martens puddle muddied. Events shatter me like an abused
cat, one eye torn out. I won't be the dirty girl again. I still fall on the ground weekly.
Leaves convene in my hair like Bible verses in someone else's head. What victim has
time for Jesus?
A strong melody like a bone I hold to crush the boys with dicks out. Their milky white
songs are nothing I want to hear, radio never tuned to a sympathetic station. I can sulk or
I can tighten my black boots, take to the burning sidewalk like it's yesterday, like it's
nowhere I'll fall today.
Sarah Lilius is the author of four chapbooks including "GIRL" (dancing girl press, 2017), and "Thirsty Bones" (Blood Pudding Press, 2017). Some of her publication credits include the Denver Quarterly, Court Green, BlazeVOX, Bluestem, Tinderbox, Stirring, Luna Luna Magazine, Entropy and Flapperhouse. She lives in Arlington, VA with her husband and two sons."
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