Russell Justwrite 5

The birthplace of my identity, where rivers intersect and the banks flood when it rains, hard, like the clouds are breaking hearts next to shattered vases, spiders in the cabinet covering their ears with four of their legs. Sometimes my hair is sticky silk, a web where your fingers are caught. My hand flutters to your arm and I tell you I never learned how to fly, but I can land anywhere. You tell me to look at the sky as if I'll find something there. All I find is myself, uncover her in the sand and remember why I left, trace the fingerprints on her thighs and tell her she still has more healing to do. When she tries to explain, I gather sand in china teacups and pour it down her throat, fill her to the brim with sand and watch it gloss at the edges, becoming glass around her gaping lips. I tell her she is a vase I never want to break, a fragile teacup chipped at the rim, a crack down its thin spine, my fingers on either side, trying to close the wound. The people around me are shouting, but I don't understand their words. My hands clamp over their mouths, and I am close enough to count their eyelashes. Rivers converge on their skin. I back into the ocean, deep enough to taste the salt. I think about the last time the banks flooded.