“Pangea,” “Blind” and “Self Portrait: Highjacked”

In Issue 48 by A. Hayes

“Pangea,” “Blind” and “Self Portrait: Highjacked”

Pangea

in the beginning

there were no delineations markers or boundaries shaping his from

hers

quotation marks he said she said

rivers mapping theirs from ours

after the breakapart happened and cells formed their shimmering walls

osmosis became a necessary violence

no one saw it coming: the way things melded

shapes shifted and melted altogether

primordial edges dissolving

the alchemical goo of a cocoon’s dark secret

it’s lonely here in this void with no landmarks

but I have always been drawn to the amorphous

the mist and surrender to breath and skin

whose rhythm is whose

the battle for autonomy wages on until it doesn’t

and then there is only this:

everything.

Blind

When Psyche went in search of Eros

She found him asleep, curled and naked

Glowing in the light of her small flame.

The hot wax dripped, burnt him awake,

But not before she’d seen him:

Verdant, erect, forbidden.

She fell again, this time eyes open.

You can hardly blame her.

A glimpse, even in dim light,

Even without his knowing,

Was what she groped for, hungry.

So if I blindfold you,

Tie your hands,

Moving silent as a candle,

Trailing my fingers along

Your freckled and rippled skin,

Kissing your broad, tender mouth,

My tongue a conduit for

The current running through you,

Don’t misunderstand.

It’s not your power I want–

But your guard, your careful watching.

A glimpse of love is never enough.

Self Portrait: Highjacked

The fruit quickens

Pregnant with knowing

Pregunta, the Spanish say, for Question

She hangs breathless in the air

Teetering, hushed, sapful, ripe

A query, a question mark, a woman’s curve

She asks for only one thing

Again and again

To be seen

To be seen

About the Author

A. Hayes

A. Hayes is an actor, director, and singer and has been writing poetry most of her life. Her book of essays, A Collection of Wednesdays, was published in 2010 (Zondervan/Harper Collins). She lives in NYC and Vermont and is most happy in her garden.

Read more work by A. Hayes .

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