The dream about teeth

Again. There. A dream, a tantrum marking its territory again last night. Wailing, refusing. A pretty little baby’s face all red and slippery with spit. Hush, little baby. Don’t you cry. How to comfort what you can’t understand? I bent down to offer myself to you, but I became frightened, my teeth shattering into a thousand broken pieces. Images, hopes, identities, emails, pride, friendships, pain, love, grief. I’m busy with this, little baby. Someone help her, please. I’m busy with this, little baby. I touched my chest and felt the heart of mother, but the song wouldn’t come. A thousand broken pieces standing guard at the spot where melodies emerge and baby sniffs the air for mama’s loving breath. If I sing to you, who will save me? Years of doomsday hoarding all the things I thought I was, all the ways I pretend to be, a Good. Beautiful. Honest. Person. Darling down on the floor. Your tears and your cries and your spit and your demanding, I hate to tell you this, but you can’t hold on to things forever. I try to open my silly mouth. I test the moment, testing gravity. Peel my lips apart. Hope falls smug like it was line-leader on the first day of school. Pride dangles like a limp weed. The naivety. That it might survive. Grab it with a thumb and a finger, I put it out of its misery. Love tumbles over a protective lip, and emails swim in saliva waiting for the big rinse. Little girl, pretty little baby, is that a smile? Your nose is a perfect button, did you know? Touch my mouth with your small, sweet hands that smell like honey and dirt. Investigate the crime, the war on self, the barricades and the arsenal. Tiny fingers touch the spot where expectations hung, and it feels like forgiveness so I kiss your fingertip. This, a sweet touch, a kind of grace, soothes me. All you want is a song and I’ll I’ve done is imprison the tune. Let me sing for you. Does this sound Good. Beautiful. Honest.? ‘Mama’s little baby loves shortnin’ shortnin’, Mama’s little baby loves shortnin’ bread.’ The rest of it falls. Teeth, dreams, they’re all the same. And you, Content and Delighted, couldn’t be more in love with a mama who sings to you. I smile at you. I smile at myself. My voice is not so bad, is it? ‘Mama’s little baby loves shortnin’ shortnin’, Mama’s little baby loves shortnin’ bread.’

Considerations

If you’re a wanderer and a wonderer, you walk. You don’t have a problem with it. I prefer it. In the city, it’s easy because you are always found; found by people, found by landmarks, found by the man counting bottles whose name you never learned but whose spot is claimed. How long will he own it without a deed? No one knows, but it’s his and I respect this assignment he’s given himself. He knows something I don’t, but the knowledge comes from a time before and a time below; before the world was so recognizable, below the layer of want and desire. Without lifting his eyes, he signals the way home, or at least the way to what is known. I remember a time before knowing, before reprimand and shame and courage.

In the country, I chewed on a weed because an old man in a picture was doing the same thing. Sour grass is a way God reveals itself. There was a time I didn’t know I should be grateful, but hit a patch of sour grass and I celebrated like the best birthday you ever had, or the best birthday you ever could have. It belongs to you, sour grass, because it comes from God. In the country you find yourself in the strangest of places. Before you shaved your legs, before anything was wrong with you, the sour grass tickles your ankles and reminds you it’s there. Before they say your writing is too flowery. Before a bike lane is a bike lane and you have to pretend that this is real life and roads can’t be roads without bike lanes and carefully selected paint colors. Wander, reassured by the weeds, but we from the country know every step is a leap from a cliff; nothing to remind you of where you came from and nothing hinting at where you’ll arrive. Up is the sun, over is the tree, corner is the flower, right is the deer. You never end up anywhere here really. If you’re lucky you can rest a while in Nana’s lap. You hit the end of a trail, the stone marking the spot singing a song called Carry On, because it knows home is just another way, another road, another walk, another trail. It’s better this way, not to name anything, not to invent more bike lanes before you deeply understand sour grass. Not to really have a home, not to even seek it, but look for Nana and find her where you can so weariness dissolves into rest into newness. Let her chin tickle your forehead, let your head on her breast count the rhythm of her heartbeat, something to remind you of the pulse of the before and below. Smell the overused pan with the old oil burned into it in her shirt, on the walls, in the couch cushions. Let it rock you to sleep, but don’t stay too long. You must Carry On.

Original art by Eliza Fedewicz @elizabydesign