No Body Else but Yours
By
Jennifer Angelina Petro
Listen, trees
breathe you
breath drawn
from roots,
drawn from darkness,
that, in turn,
breathe the earth
cradled in arms
that spiral stars
with revolutions
of joy.
The next time
you feel wind
on your face,
know you are dear
to the heart
of the world;
how you are
touched
with eternity
breathed
from lungs
of love and sighs,
that are, in turn,
born from a longing
for nothing more
than a glance
that is no body
else’s but yours.
Occulted
By
Jennifer Angelina Petro
The chimeric afternoon
Lifts its head, as I venture out
For the first time in three days.
I mask my face against the belladonna air,
Each step feeling modestly feral,
Each sifted breath more defiant than the last.
It occurs to me, as the swift, April wind
Spindles through my hair:
There is nothing I wouldn’t give
To lie with you in the cherry-blossom-petaled grass,
Hands clasped, holding on
Through an uncertain, occulted future.
What I wouldn’t give
To Netflix with you in bed,
Blankets warm, lights off. If only you were here.
If only you existed.
What I wouldn’t give to be vivified by a kiss.
As it is, each step slows in the miasmic
Walk back to what I call home.
I climb the steps, turning to look for you
One last time. I open the door. I close the door.
I walk into my spell-bound apartment
And sit on the couch.
I do not look out the window,
Passed the magnolia tree,
To the sidewalk below,
To see if you spirited home with me. Instead,
I remove my mask, I close my eyes,
And merge back into the sonorous silence.
Musings on Prayers and Kisses
By
Jennifer Angelina Petro
Trying to pray with your eyes open is like trying to walk with your eyes closed. One distracts you, the other confuses you, but the end result is the same—clumsiness. Trying to kiss with your eyes open is more an act of will and wide-eyed-giggling than it is: “I must see where my face is going.” Lips know. The soul knows. The feet do not without aid of the eyes. Then again, it must be considered not all prayers are the same, just as not all kisses are the same. And I must say at the beginning, I am musing along with you as I write these words. The ideas herein are like the aforementioned legs without eyes to guide them. I do have certain experience, albeit limited, with both kissing and praying, but I am roaming these topics of heaven-given moments with as much anticipation as you to see where they lead.
One can kiss a lover, friend, or a child “Good morning—have a good day”—with eyes open (perhaps, however, while staring at the coffee maker or the clock). One can kiss a lover with eyes open—wild, seeing everything—following the other’s eyes like search lights, but that’s usually at first contact—when clothes are dropping off ready bodies, like swollen seed-husks falling from blossoming flowers. Eventually the eyes close and you both connect, like living magnets, and both exhale–surrendering into that intimate vulnerability of having someone ornament your body with decorating kisses. We have an interesting distinction here: eyes open during the initial flurry of passion, then eyes close when things settle in a pulsing rhythm of bodies, and the feast of lips tasting lips. Then, one begins exploring the other’s body with kisses as the other’s eyes close in deep, rising and sinking sighs. And when the lips find the places where rapture happens both lovers’ eyes close. That being said, it’s not uncommon for the one receiving to have their eyes fly open with: “Oh God! Oh God!” When the sweet release comes, and the waves shimmer through the body, the eyes most often close like the deepest, most calming, evening. And when the lovers switch places, the process unfolds, with any luck, the same way.
Prayer is very much the same, only different. So is singing, but that’s another essay. In praying, as in nighttime prayers (that often slip so easily into sleep), the eyes close to shroud the whispers that kiss the dark. Morning prayers too are most often said with eyes closed, head bowed before the body of the day. Of course, there are those prayers where the whole body participates, as when the sea rolls through your body during love making. Dancing prayers, yogic prayers, walking prayers, making coffee for your partner prayers—these are all eyes-open prayers—even if your eyes are drooping with not enough sleep. There are vigil prayers when candles are meditated upon, and lives gone are reflected upon, and hopes for peace rise to the sky. During vespers, the eyes can be open or closed, as the prayers wish for safe sleep and warmth. Then, there are prayers we pray for someone else—someone sick or struggling through a rough patch—these prayers are almost always asked with eyes closed in supplication and intensity, as when we humbly, or boldly ask a lover to kiss us in the places we want kissed. There are prayers of wonder, as when we see stars and newborn babies and sunsets and moon rises. These are prayed with gasps and awes, as when your lover’s lips find the tingling places on your body—eyes suddenly open with surprise and reverence. There are rote prayers where the eyes automatically close because everyone else’s automatically close and if you sneak your eyes open and scan the room full of closed-eyed people you feel a sprinkle mischievous and a dash voyeuristic, and perhaps a pinch of outright rebel. These are moments akin to opening one eye during a kiss to catch the reaction of your lover. Both are perfectly acceptable, of course, for they inspire the fun of witnessing community and union, provided the eyes aren’t opening in either case with insecurity to check whether or not you’re kissing well or praying with the proper piety. Hopefully, however, there are very few rote kisses in your lives. There are prayers of prophecy—spontaneous and unplanned like wild, ravishing kisses predicting soon to come release. Your eyes are always open during these prayers while your lover’s are usually closed with faith and the sweet, blessed, little fear that sometimes accompanies letting go to the control of another. There are also the prayers of grace and blessings before a meal, which can easily be translated into prayers of gratitude before feasting at the table of your lover’s body. Lastly, there are prayers of ecstasy, when your eyes close seeing lights and visions, and the soul stirs awake and bliss shimmers through your entire body, and exclamations of: “Oh God, Oh God!” soar around the room. We don’t have to imagine too hard to know which kisses these are like and where they settle and deepen and what the eyes do when such rapture happens.
Well, there we have it. I truly had no idea where this was going. Now that we’re drawing to a close (or a curious, intriguing opening) it is my hope this meandering piece inspires you to kiss more reverently and to pray with more wildness; to kiss with more attention and devotion, and to pray with more openness to revelation; to kiss more adventurously and to pray more like the trees must pray, like the sea must pray, like the shore must pray, like a hawk gliding on spiraling currents must pray, like the mother bear awakening with cubs must pray, like the owl must pray keeping watch over fields and marshes. In other words, may our prayers and kisses become one and the same, where Lover and Beloved become one and the same–one breath, one sparkling river, one song of praise.
Trauma Returns V
By
Jennifer Angelina Petro
There is a way of never reaching out to be held again that is like a tree standing in a spring clearing, never to grow leaves. There is a way of living knowing no arms could ever fill the emptiness you carry that is like walking alone down an endless dusty summer road. There is a way of existing that precludes any sense of being comforted that renders one’s spirit silent, like an empty house. There are times when pillows become the receivers of the kinds of embraces and tears a scared child should be able to share with a parent, or, in the best-case scenario, a dear friend, or even a stranger who completely understands such ambiguous and deep loneliness. There is a way of moving in the world with such grief and loss, that it’s like having undigested food sitting in one’s guts, and yet, still being hungry night and day. Today, the pillows are once again receiving hugs and the tears that come and go in aching waves, because no one can ever be trusted to hold this grounded falcon, this being of living fog, this feral heart that recoils—thrashing from the offered arms, this darkness that is like living in stone and yet somehow being able to breathe and watch, but never to soften again. All the while longing to be scooped up and rocked, like a nest in the arms of a tree in the light of the moon.
Trauma Returning II
By
Jennifer Angelina Petro
Is it a longing for the divine that burns just behind every moment and interaction with someone? No, it can’t be. The divine is everywhere I turn and in everyone I see. This soul-loneliness then must just be there, like an underground abandoned and crumbling church lit by a single, ever-burning candle. No matter how it flickers in the winds of sighs and the passing of ghosts, it remains lit—an ever-present reminder of solitary confinement. There are friends aplenty in my life. There are people who love me and whom I love. There are times our voices lift together in praise. There are times laughter fills the room. And yet, the soul-loneliness lives just behind every moment and interaction. Trauma does that. It is a severing of lifelines, a smashing of lifeboats, a drifting away on the sea. This is not to say I am ungrateful for your company. It is to say: that lost look in my eyes is a shadow on the wall of that little candle in that underground church, and nothing, it seems, can ever fill that space with light and singing, community, and warmth. Please, I beg you, don’t ever stop trying. It is your persistence and compassion, and my limited abilities to be present in your presence, that keep me going. And sometimes I can stand in that church and feel triumphant, and maybe even sing in my weeping. Mostly, the soul-loneliness fills me with dust, as the church slowly crumbles. Trauma does that. It defines a perimeter where wounds cannot be reached. And the divine is everywhere. Even in that church. I know that in my mind. Trouble is—all sense of comfort and safety from that holy, living light were stolen, and so the divine feels more like a wind from somewhere far away, trying to make a wish and blow out that little candle. Trauma does that. May the birthday one day come.
The Root of Us All
By
Jennifer Angelina Petro
Flowers flower from the branch,
Branches flower from the tree,
Trees flower from the ground,
The ground flowers from the earth,
The earth flowers from love’s universe,
Love’s universe flowers from many minds
And many hearts and many wishes and many prayers.
Minds flower from seed,
Hearts flower from fire,
Wishes flower from all children,
Prayers flower from pain.
You flower from me,
I flower from you,
We flower from need,
And need flowers from desire,
Desire flowers from all space,
And all time, and everything right
With the world.
Waves flower from the sea,
The sea flowers from longing,
Longing flowers from love once known
Calling us home,
Home flowers from hearth and bed.
Love flowers from our hands,
Our hands flower from our limbs,
Our limbs flower from our bodies,
Our bodies flower from union,
Union flowers from creation everlasting
Everlasting flowers from joy,
Joy flowers from need,
Need flowers from want,
Want flowers from gardens of many fragrances and colors,
Many colors flower from infinity’s imagination,
Imagination flowers from the hands of a child,
And a child is the root of us all,
All of us flower from variety’s branches,
Branches flower from the tree,
The tree flowers from the ground,
The ground flowers from where you stand,
Your standing flowers from community,
Community flowers hands opening,
Hands opening flower from pain lived,
Pain lived flowers from the bravery of a child,
And a child is the root of us all.
The Gravity of Longing
By
Jennifer Angelina Petro
The moon reaches down
Lifting the waves in her cupped hands,
Scales of fish contain petals of the sun,
Moths slip the gravity of their longing
Letting their wings catch fire,
Wind arrives at street corners, spinning leaves
In little galaxies,
Deer move as solemn Druids,
Leaving angel hoof-prints in the snow,
Union and separation whirl in expanding
And contracting orbits of desire,
Creation wheels around the flame of god,
The road of your passion unfurls before you,
With a keenness that washes your hair and hands–
Sing—
Keep your prayers coming and your steps light–
They will return home, dancing.
I Don’t Know How I Know This
By
Jennifer Angelina Petro
Inside the uplift of death—that moment–
When the white doors open
You will fly out of yourself long enough
To fly back into yourself in one terrible
And freeing inhaling exhale.
Daffodils lose their vibrant trumpets
To the sunlight, irises curl in on themselves
And alliums drop their radiating, purple petals to the ground.
Cherry blossoms scatter their thousand, million pink pieces
Of exquisite beauty into a spring wind that rouses
The mind to start moving on those plans laid out in winter,
And you cannot help but stare, and weep with such joy the moment
Uplifts and white doors open, and you fly into yourself
Long enough to fly back out yourself in one orgasmic,
Eternal—breath-catching inhaling exhale.
And when the sidewalks become dusted
In deep pink—so much so you cannot see the gray ground—
White doors open and you fly out of yourself long enough
To never return to the state of unnoticing.
Every moment we build up and break down,
We dissolve, we sag closer to the earth,
Our muscles loosen, our jaws slacken,
And we become like fragile, spring birds long enough
To breathe into ourselves, long enough
To exhale one last time into the air—
Just strong enough to blow open the white doors
And get swept up into the uplift where all the trumpeting
Daffodils wait, where all the irises unfurl
Their sex to the sky, where all the alliums burst
Purple bulbs from their tall, slender stalks, like
Slow motion fireworks—
There you will stay long enough
To bloom the fragrance
Of a life well lived into the ever spring
Of God.
Angel Speak
By
Jennifer Angelina Petro
Every night, a friend
Comes to talk with me,
Carrying word of faraway
And intimately near places.
Sometimes she talks,
Animatedly, with an urgency
Known only to those with important news,
Sometimes she talks
In gently bobbing waves of psychedelia,
Which carry me on their drifting
Clouds to the shores of morning.
Sometimes she chases me
Without a word—just pursuing me
As if I were quarry, sometimes
She drops me, plunging me
Into the day, sweating and panicked.
Even when she appears sinister,
I have come to know she simply wants
To send messages from the soul.
And every morning, I wake
And forget everything
She said. Well, some of it
Lingers for a few moments, like
The scent of honeysuckle in spring;
But eventually, as I dress,
And rustle papers and books,
It fades, or lifts, or blows,
Or flies, or runs
Away.
I think sometimes
What if she ached to be known,
To be heard, to be validated, seen?
What if she simply wanted
To be there, like
An angel by the riverside.
Indeed, what if
All dreams were flocks of angels
Forming grand gestures and landscapes
Of secrets intent on revelation?
What if she was trying
To tell me she needed help
Or that the spiritual world
Was in trouble?
What if she was trying to tell me
That it’s time, as I sleep
Through my day,
To wake up and start singing?
All donations go to medical bills and groceries. Thank for your support. <3
Turning In
By
Jennifer Angelina Petro
At night, when our bodies
Begin to slow down, and our eyelids
Become heavy, we turn in,
And our attention
Recedes from the senses,
And we move into ourselves and dream.
And we all know dreaming
Is just the soul saying what it wanted
During the day but couldn’t,
And as we are drawn inwards,
And our breathing drifts like it was meant to,
And we rescind control over our bodies,
And our lips part and our palms open,
And our arms go this way and that,
We begin catching z’s—the buzz
Of fluorescent lights becomes the buzz of bees
Making honey out of our disappointments,
The hum of the fan of our laptops
Becomes the hush of owl’s wings,
And we yield like this every day–
Every day we relinquish the tenuous hold
We have on our lives and surrender
To the darkness living within us—
The selfsame darkness that holds the voice of desire–
Speaking like a lighthouse to approaching ships,
Speaking like the hummingbird daring us
To try and follow where it goes,
Speaking like moonlight on the river,
Speaking like our soul bowing down before us
Aching for us to listen.