Work Text:
for a devout man, james novak
does not understand how to love anything holy.
he tries. in sleep, he extends his hands toward you,
far as they can go. a hug, maybe. child of god. smallest
wingspan. you must be careful with fine china, must
not let it burn up in firing. you demure, recede. and
he lets you.
you are a flaming ball of matter and destruction
that looms hungrily over his picket fence. and
he keeps you.
fragile little bird in your grasp. hallowed bones.
eyes of grace. frightlessly knowing your shape.
ever-willing glass hammer. yours. sometimes,
this scares you.
sometimes, you can feel his mind resist against
the bit of your command, your orders, and this,
too, scares you, because you cannot always see
the line between his doubt and yours. who lives
in whose vessel? who balks at the scent of ash,
the sound of a steady march? terror.
you push him back. regress. and he lets you. and
he hates you.
at some point you will learn to stop fighting this
body. all it wants is to hold you. it just isn't big
enough to reach. your wrists are too large for
its grasp.
but when the beast of your mind falls silent. and
when the snow of your soul blankets heavy. and
when his hands come up in prayer to his own neck.
and when you remember that you disobey no one
in moving him, gently, toward the window to see
the sun set. then something beautiful begins.
sunshine. and starlight. and cold metal lampposts.
lakewater. terrycloth. and hardcover books. he says,
you've been alive since before fish breathed, and
you've never seen a movie? popcorn. and low lights.
and soft, cushioned seats. whatever you can fit in
between the war. white knuckles on the arm rests.
you disobey no one. you disobey no one. heaven
does not know the shape of his ribs in the morning.
and when it leaves you battered and bruised, whose
hands show you how to heal? whose palms cup
beneath the sink to wash the blood from your
sallow cheeks? whose sorrowed eyes stare back
into you from the mirror? jimmy hasn't spoken
to you in a long, long time, but his eyes are saying,
i love you still. i wish you'd come home. you say
okay. you dry your hands. you order pizza. you
come home.
one day. you don't know what caused it. but
you feel it happen.
the man who gave you a home dies.
he dies inside you.
like a single match flicking out in the vast expanse
of a nebula.
hollowed.
somehow you notice his absence everywhere. this
is not possible, because you are his presence
everywhere.
still.
much later, a man teaches you to ride a bike.
you get it first try, because jimmy's arms and legs,
considerate and forethinking as he always was, are
lined with the love letter of his untold knowledge
upon every muscle.
you shoot off like a comet downhill. the man,
very far away now, woops victoriously. your smile
is impossible. you almost cannot breathe. you are
flying. soaring. your hands lift from the handles.
your body holds you.
you have never ridden a bike before. but his body
remembers the thrill. his heart races. within the
swell of his throat there builds a sun of laughter.
you wonder who taught him. you wonder if he
ever missed the feeling. you regret so much.
as the wind beats your eyes, you notice
that you have begun to cry.
holy water, you think. the sun is setting to your left.
you turn, still flying, and watch as it disappears behind
a horizon which you were once able to touch. rivers of holy
water.
.rdc