swelling
the wood is swollen the door won’t shut, blowing open in the wind womb bellowing for space between womb bellowing for the water the wind screams against the window pane i give in to the rot taking the tissue away to find my nose is bleeding again always looking for meaning in everything pining for something outside of the darkness where i sit, where i stand… she tells me i’m shining brightly but i’m keening, seeing only the pitch black night and feeling the swelling of the wood against my palm i should stop this i should stop but i can’t, inhaling mould spores like i’m part of the forest i’m part of this, i tell myself something bigger something growing the womb of the wood, creaking what would my child look like? i wouldn’t want to know, to pass on my roots, rotting everyone i know has been ballooning til they pop and i’m here barren palm to the wood, wet and dark pulling me in, making me so cold, so cold, the damp is near impossible to shake it’s in my bones, spreading a wet cough, a death rattle the veins of my chest turning darker purple blue black all seeing until i’m one with the night with the wood, with the darkness hair tangled like tree branches sparring in the wind and they’ve been warring for days, battering against force, no leaves left while i watch, wounded in the crevices shaking like a leaf too, shaking dancing like a demon against the wood’s cavity the frightened deer shrieks as its hooves slide in the dirt desperately fighting for equilibrium while the hunter, staunch as ever, guns him down and watches as he takes his final breaths, still desperate to live until a last shudder marks an end point eyes glassy, dark until they too are taken by the rot taken back into the wood from where they came, the whorls in the tree trunk remembering and watching as i watch and remember, the swelling of the wood against my palm, within the eye of my hand as i become one with the wood’s creaking, wailing, swaying giving way to the wind in the night.