the pleasure of gravity

I have a scrape on my back from Robert Ross’ grave, where A and I were brushing tongues and surveying a distant landfill. A soggy bowl in the earth, a soggy bowl in my skin, made to make us forget, but only half-succeeding. Our bodies swallow truths.

The thought of a ballgame crawls uphill, and I cheer along. Yellow, strong, proud. It reminds me of a mother’s love.

Later that day I oscillate between sky and soil. My spine knows the pleasure of gravity. It tells me that I trust. Carnal, and oozing, and rather than running from life, I run towards it. What a relief.

I recently learned that the word “conversation” once meant “a place where one lives or dwells.”¹ My conversation is with the socket of a valley, the elbow of the woods. Baby blue and scented by beasts. The doors are thin, and F waits outside, ready to show me a way.

1. Harper, Douglas. “Etymology of conversation.” Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com/word/conversation. Accessed 25 April, 2023.