POETRY BY ALEDA BLISS
Updated: Aug 15, 2019
snow white, rose red
you are mine and i am yours
we were fleshed in the same womb,
weren’t we?
i know how water feels to you.
we are the same, girl. our hunger
is the same,
isn’t it?
—
he comes lumbering over the hill
the great bulk of him
looking for
honey
smelling me out
scoops the girlhood
from the corners of my eyes
elbows shinbones clavicle ear
his hands row me down
to a song i heard once
from the miller’s
daughter
palm on my throat
teeth on my hem,
seeking me out
in my every waiting place
—
the bed beside me is leaking
your body sticky with honey you slip in
late night after night
i am treading alone
and still you speak
nothing
but you hands are not the same
and the twist of your arms in the new white dress
full of subtle tricks
i haven’t yet learned
how long has it been there
that place in your throat?
his eyes on you
there
his tongue lingers
there
and you turn your new neck
smiling
away
—
there's no space between us,
is there, my girl?
no space that a tremble could swallow up
whole.
spell
beneath the surface i see
something transcendent in silk
and no i will not give myself up
for lent
i want light
and to dance. i want to kiss
him on the mouth. i mean you
to begin with
you kiss me
where it counts. shaking the dead
skin shifting
the shit sifting
what never was mine
to begin with
there are oceans
in my stomach and we talk a lot in space.
you are driving the car and i am choosing
the song. i don’t know what comes next.
my feet hanging out the window.
there are only finite letters
for the way in which
i ____ you.
when the body
walks into this room here, this bare room and sits down in a wooden chair.
sits down across from you, clears your throat, un-wrinkles your tongue.
what happens between two people?
to the other. are you other?
to account for it. a row of teeth. the same, with different names.
blue, blue, it used to be blue. endless, an ocean,
what happens in the dark.
that day we couldn’t let each other look the other in the eye.
after, or before. two bellies held like spoons
what happens in the dark?
un withering, we die
is that how it happens? all falls,
the hand, a ballast.
we do not recover.
the site of such a face
describe the color yellow, without describing anything yellow
describe the color green only using your teeth
you do not have a sum for it, no space before or after.
inside all these years, i still see you, in the dark.
Aleda Bliss is an actress and a poet. She lives in Brooklyn, NY.
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