Springtide by Mara Cregan

SPRINGTIDE

by emily schwager

TABLE OF CONTENTS: A Thank You……………………………………………………………………………………….…..pg. 4 Withdrawn……………………………………………………………………………….……………pg. 5 Letter to the Golden Girl …………………………………………………………………………pg. 6 Different Seasons, Different Boys…………………………………………………….………pg. 7 Love Letter to Donald Trump………………………………………………………………….pg. 8 Five Guys…………………………………………………………………………………...….……….pg. 9 Spring Adventures……………………………………………………………..…..….……..……pg. 10 This is Not a Love Poem.…………………………………….…………………………..……….pg. 11 Coffee………………………………………………………………………………………..…..………pg. 12 Sin of the Calf……………………………………………………………………….…...…...…….….pg. 13 In Preparation for Summer……………………………………………………………..……….pg. 14 How To Tell Someone You Can’t Be Friends Anymore……………………………...pg. 15-‐17 Babysitting Arlo…………………………………………………………………..…….……..……pg. 18 An Apology………………………………………………………………………….…….…….….…pg. 19 Saturday Brunch………………………………………………………………….…….….………pg. 20 Ode to the Bearded Boy………………………………………………………..…….……….…pg. 21

DEDICATION: ~*To my mom, dad and grandparents, who are the most intelligent, goofy and supportive people I know.*~ ~*To all of my friends, who are my inspiration and my expression.*~ ~*To everyone I wrote to, here is a compilation of things I wanted to say but never did.*~

A Thank You i. You sit, cross legged, next to a tomb stone—poised and exposed as though you might take too deep of a breath and float up, up, up—so numb and so aloof, you don't realize how far you have suspended yourself. I am holding your hand, grounded, an observer. For once, I am the one guiding you. You smile at me, dreamily. This is a right of passage. This is a celebration. ii. Levelheaded, curly-‐headed, you with the crooked pinkies, take me by the hand and lead me towards a red river. It is winter and we walk gently over the frost coated grass, barefoot and blue-‐lipped, as graceful as snow fairies. When we reach the edge, you hold my hair so I can dip my head into the water. You call me Achilles, and my mind is no longer vulnerable. iii. I lay on my back, motionless and openmouthed. You stand above me, arms extended. Calmly, almost as if not at all, you reach into my mouth and extract a glowing blue orb the size of a cherry pit from the back of my throat. You place it in the palm of your hand and examine it—careful and tender—before squishing it between your fingers. I never thanked you for saving my life— I was choking to death.

Withdrawn My cheeks are the raw, fleshy insides of a grapefruit and the trees freeze like statues dipped in milk. It is silent, the woods mourn every skeleton and root. My dog’s paws fall onto the firm, stained snow—absolutely mute, My throat is shrinking; each gasp renders me ill; my cheeks are the raw, fleshy insides of a grapefruit. My sleeve is soaked with saline, it pollutes my brain, unjustified and overpowering. I walk until it is silenced. The woods mourn every skeleton and root. I extract a dandelion from my marrow, place it in your champagne flute. I am adrift. I am told I am adrift. I am leaking downhill. My cheeks are the raw, fleshy insides of a grapefruit My eyelids fall. I fall with them. My vitality is minute. The bench is frigid and estranged, I am confined in a bastille that is silent. The woods mourn every skeleton and root. I call to you, hoping you will uproot Me, buried under spoiled snow. (But you’re racing uphill.) My cheeks are the raw, fleshy insides of a grapefruit; it is silent, the woods mourn every skeleton and root.

A Letter To The Golden Girl When I first saw you it was like looking into the sun. Daughter of the sky, you were drenched in ultraviolet from pinky to pelvis. It dripped from your bangs and stained your cheeks. You smiled at me and I was sunburned. When I first saw you it was like going to my first show. It was the sound of the guitar when they hooked it onto the amp and even more so when they were strumming out of tune. You linked our pinkies, sipped my root-‐beer and nodded along to the music, foot tapping, body swaying—you didn’t know how to be graceful until no one was watching. When I first saw you it was like stripping into our underwear and sinking into a bitter river. Like sisterhood. You were bloom / vigor / energy and inosculated, we grew together from the dirt. Intertwined and blinded, I hadn’t realized when I had stopped breathing.

different seasons, different boys i. humid morning air, we travel: agile and sober under a dark sky. you—all bike and flesh and brusque; me, a breathless silhouette. ii. hiking through frick park: barren trees and fallen leaves. the sky is gray, the grass is gray, the pond is gray, everything but us is gray. iii. a basement, throbbing, music pouring though the door— boy, you love this band. we stumble to panera, you, defrosting with the snow. iv. the grass is itchy— and your head rests on my lap. i play with your hair. the graveyard is silent with us. springtime: blue skies, blue boy.

A Love Letter to Donald Trump I have a confession: I have this insatiable addiction to overpriced hair products. That, and thousand dollar suits sewn by underpaid Mexican workers, and orange skin treatment and 18k rose gold wrist watches and French made cuffs. See the truth is, I’m a conservative republican. I mean, don’t tell anybody but I can’t stop reading about your legal immigration policy. I mean, I love the way late night comedians just rip you apart. I mean, you only went bankrupt four times. You say you’re worth ten billion, honey, oh little did you know you’re not even worth half of that. It’s okay though. I like it that way. Like, you’re the definition of vainglory, like your hair cut costs more than my college tuition. You see, it just, ensured my vote when you said you would bang your daughter. It made me realize what a family man you were. I want to write racist tweets with you. I want to question Obama’s birth with you. I want to ignore global warming with you and sit on my couch on November 8th of 2016 to watch you get elected to be the first Orange-‐American president of the United States. I want to deport entire families with you. One night, I find myself sitting in my basement, watching the republican debates. I envision you—a real American—leading our country, so powerful and sexy and unaware of how to negotiate foreign policy. God Bless you, Mr. Trump and God Bless America.

Five Guys We raise thick burgers to watery mouths, Bite. Swallow. Sip cherry cola, our mouths chew the words we want to say, the words we have been ingesting for months. You open your mouth, close it. You sit across from me, a melanistic wolf. I avoid your gaze, dip a fry in ketchup and place it in my mouth. Old arguments churn in my stomach like bad milk. We finish our burgers. Wipe our mouths. Thing have felt off between us you say. Peanut shells are strewn on the table. I crack one with my mouth. I bite the inside of my cheek with my teeth, taste the blood in my mouth. Words that had set up camp on my tongue find their way to the front of my mouth. We have been sitting here long enough for the rainwater to dry from our clothes. My mouth— chaotic. Reminder: You are not angry, Emily. Taught lips loosen, shoulders relax. We sit, vulnerable, open mouthed.

Spring Adventures The yellow custard drips on pink fingers, and every ray of sun will kiss the train and tracks below our feet. Her smile lingers on freckled cheeks and I cannot abstain from capturing the way you thaw into the sky. It smells like street art and your sweat, unholy bricks are cracked and melt onto the road. (You pray the cops will get upset.) We stand above the birds, drop with the storm. the chains sway like tits in the spring, and we loose the crater in the fence. The lukewarm air blows ginger and brown bangs. We agree to cut mangos here ‘cause summers not far, you take my hand and pull me towards the car.

This is Not a Love Poem: When We Used to Hang Out (Before You Got a Girlfriend) Saturday mornings, we would travel to the forest after soaking cheap sushi in cheap soy sauce and sipping over-priced bubble tea—You, humming to the radio and me, arms swaying to the music, agile and vulgar as the leaves that crunched beneath our toes. I discovered treasures under my fingernails, discovered treasures inside geocaches buried in the forest. You were my yellow bird and you made me radiate shades of aureolin, made music emit from my pours like sweat. You leave traces of yourself in my pockets. You will leave for Philadelphia on my birthday. You have discovered what 5:00am looks like with someone else. The forests you navigate with her are more seductive and unpredictable but she makes you radiate shades I never will—never want to—be able to. The music you sing for her is the same music you sing for me—but sweeter. It leaves me pooling in my basement like distilled seltzer, discovering how to seep into the ground and drain into the forest. I've started biting my fingernails again and It's difficult to radiate the same shades of aureolin without you. Now, I radiate stains of rubicund and the music I write it often chaotic. (You tell me it’s spring but the leaves are not green.) You have discovered a way out of our forest without me. I wait until you pry yourself away and sneak to my house to make fresh squeezed lemonade and pancakes at 1:00am. We are older but we radiate the same ancient energy that we have for 16 years. We play soft music and avoid talking about her but when you leave I allow myself to flood the basement, to discover what the insides of my drainpipe look like. (I am abandoned in this forest.) I have discovered how to escape the woods without you and the forest is learning how to survive without your music. When you leave, I will invent new colors to radiate.

Coffee (To Emily) i. After you get dressed you walk downstairs to meet me. Steaming; I kiss you.

ii. Today you said I’m sweet like sugar, baby, you love sugar, baby. But then you didn't use one teaspoon of sugar, baby.

iii. Tips to stay awake: Bite the inside of your cheek, mix me with your blood. iv. You call me smoky, resinous, you say I’m steamy, creamy, crisp. Take my waist and pull me close, you can smell like me for days.

v. You French kiss, French press me down. I’m suffocating. I think you like it.

The Sin of the Calf I am enervated. I, who cut each individual finger off and handed them to you in a diamond encrusted box, with stumps for ears and plastic replacing my teeth and eyes. And you, who nailed chains to my feet knowing that if you dropped me on an mud covered sidewalk, I would sit there to offer a painless route across. (I welcome the opportunity!) I burned my wrists dipping you in molten aureate: my own personal golden calf. I spent years condoning lies and attention-seeking falsehoods as you thieved and then christened yourself a coquette. (When you split your tongue in two, ordering one side to tell the truth and the other to lie, I only saw one side.) You, you are not sad, you are obsessed with the idea of it, with the image of sadness. You are a basket, and every morning you fill yourself with new assets, new identities, new stories and so forth. (Now you tell me I am a rose, and I wonder if you have branded yourself a thorn or a belladonna or perhaps not a flower at all.) I have removed the chains you attached to my feet; I have destroyed you, golden calf. You fake god, you imposter. You need to admit your faults, you need to break your kneecaps for me this time. I am tired of worshipping you.

In Preparation for Summer Picture this: I am standing in front of a bathroom mirror, naked; In one hand, I hold a razor— pink and unused, it sits in my palm like an unwelcome house guest that drops his coat on your carpet and eats all the food you had saved for leftovers. I stand there, belly soft and round, tits sagging in the mirror. I am a gardener, can you tell? Every night, I stand in the shower and water my willow trees, fingers brushing calves, dripping steam, bleeding dew. My legs are a rainforest, my armpits, fine ivy. And yet we have raised ourselves to think they are ugly. We have whispered to them for years saying this is how to be a woman and this is how to please a man. Beads of sweat stick to my bangs and sit on the red in my cheeks. My raw thoughts stand up, raise their fists and ask me how to love my body. I confront my reflection. I want to be naked in front of you, want you to drop to your knees, drop to your boniest bones and accept my natural flesh. Don’t tell me how to define womanhood. I am not a lady; I am a gardener. Let me breathe life when I please.

How to Tell Someone You Can’t Be Friends Anymore: Start with the soles of your feet. Tell them to keep walking every time you see him, sitting alone in the ally smoking a cigarette and highlighting a book before school. He will look up, and make eye contact with you, pleading for your sympathy, or your companionship. He will offer you a sip of his drink. It’s a little hot he will say. Don’t take it. Not because it is hot but because it will be misleading. You are angry. You are hurt. Do not let his sadness or his charm or his caffeine draw you back in. He will approach you later that morning. He will say, Are you gunna make any attempt to hang out with me or what? Don’t absorb his pain. I know you will but don't let it bother you. I know you will do that too. Take a deep breath. Respond calmly. Say, What. Yes of course. I just need to figure things out. You know this might not be true but don’t start anything until you are sure. That, if anything, is essential. Next, move to your kneecaps. In fact, address all of the bones in your body at once. Tell them not to shake when you see him. Remind them to stay still when he approaches the bookcase behind you in search of some author who writes about poetry or anarchy or maybe both. He will mutter, Sorry when he bumps into you. Don’t let him notice how much you miss him. You are nervous, I can tell. Your body is betraying you. Try to stand still. I said stand still, god damn it. He can never know these things. You will find him, sitting in front of the 61C Cafe one Sunday afternoon. You knew he would be there. You will have a speech planned. He will be wearing all green and black and looking at the ground. You will follow him onto the roof of some building overlooking the city and he will say What’s been going on with you? This

is the beginning of a very long conversation. His eyes will get watery, like that night she told him to never talk to her again. You will remember how you laid on you side and rubbed his back and the blueness of the sheets you tucked him into bed with. The roof will feel like a graveyard. Do not bury yourself in it. Be some kind of disappointed when you didn’t officially end your friendship that day. Be some kind of relieved at the same time. When you get sick two days later, not even soup will help. You friends will tell you it is because you are unhappy. Stress and sadness. That’ll do it. You will ask your therapist if that is true. Her office is colder than usual. You will blow your nose and say I don’t even have a fever. She will tell you it is heartbreak, the platonic kind. He had spent nights in your basement playing chess or convincing you to go to eat n’ park to get bottomless coffee and pie at 2:00am. You and your friends would watch movies, watch each other dance under the blue moon / under the blue snow / into the blue sky. He had left enough clothes at your house to wear for a week. You had taken over fifty disposable pictures of him but none of them were sufficient. He always looked too much: too glum, too distracted, too emotionless—but never too happy. Write him a letter. Edit it seven times. Send drafts of it to your friends. Read it to your parents. Edit it again. Stay up writing in your journal about the perfect way to tell someone you can’t have them in your life anymore. Make it sound angry. No, make it sound exhausted. Try to give it to him the next day. Chicken out. Edit it again. Tell him he messed up. Tell him this is for the best. Tell him you love him twice. Three times. Sit in bed and rip it up. Try again.

When you give him the letter, he will read it and say Okay. You will wish he made a bigger deal about the whole thing. You will be grateful he didn’t. Finally, move to your eyes. Tell them not to search for him on the street. When they do, you will find him already staring at you and this will make you crave what once was. Stop it. I said stop it. Things can never be how they were, hoping for otherwise will only twist the knife deeper. His fingernails are bitten and bloody and you can only wonder if he has told your friends what happened or if he has stayed up late, crying in his bed, chain-‐drinking tea and writing poems about you (since you have already done the latter.) Consider him: alone and corrupt, so desperate and resentful. He will approach you on Friday and ask if you want to get coffee and you must wonder: when will I find closure.

Babysitting Arlo You get into my car, barefoot, holding a cardboard cup of cold coffee, it’s past nine o’clock, and the moon emerges from beneath the roots of an old tree. I turn up the music as we drive past the graveyard: the thick spring breeze drenches my bangs. It’s past nine o’clock, and you emerge from beneath the roots of an old tree. You get into the seat next to me and we drive towards Braddock. The thick spring breeze drenches my bangs as we inhale and exhale the words buried underneath our tongues. You get out of the seat next to me when we arrive in Braddock., He exchanges Arlo for a cigarette on his front porch, inhaling and exhaling the words buried underneath his tongue. Arlo contemplates screaming for attention as he lies in his crib. He exchanges Arlo for a conversation on his front porch. I ask him, How are you doing? and he shrugs, Arlo screams for attention as he lies in his crib— our words are abandoned on the porch next to his cigarette butt. I ask him, How are you doing? and he shrugs, You get into my car, barefoot, holding a cardboard cup of warm coffee, our words are abandoned on the porch next to his cigarette butt. I turn up the music as we drive to the graveyard.

An Apology i. I’m not sure if this is an apology. If it were, I might tell you that it is okay to cry in front of me, that it is okay to sit in the passengers seat and whisper in your quietist whisper about how much you hate him (and about how much you love him.) I might run my fingers over your freshly shaven hair and say, You’re allowed to be sad, and I’m sorry. I’m not sure if it would still be an apology this way— I, of course, would still disagree with you and you would still disagree with me, but at least we would be on the same page. ii. You spot me standing outside the Roboto in between sets, eating seitan wings with greasy fingers. I follow you down the street into a back ally. I ask you if you’re still mad and you ask me if I’m still friends with him. After a while you finally look at me and say, Well, I guess this is it. It took me three weeks to finally take down all those disposable pictures of you hanging on my walls. iii. Have you ever tried talking to someone underwater? Eyes squinting, lips moving slowly—You always rush your sentences, running out of breath in thirty seconds but still talking until you feel that pressure in the back of your throat, the last bubble slipping out of your mouth tenderly. I know you must, because that’s how you sounded last month in the ally. I never understood what you were saying until yesterday when I told him we couldn’t be friends anymore. I want to let you know I was thinking of you, all blue in the face, trying to send me a message underwater.

Saturday Brunch Grilled, peppered, bacon— We eat crepes on the back porch Everything, holy. Naked and dancing— we radiate old steel mills The rain hits warm skin. Uprooting winter, Dirt under our fingernails, sweat and sweat and sweat. Cheeks, red like peaches, We eat pomegranate seeds, sipping homeless wine. Shoulder to shoulder, we give politics a seat at the brunch table. Too hot for leather, we sit in short sleeved flannels and never wear shoes.

Sautéed potatoes, onions, bacon, eggs and grits— the menu today.

We lick the plates clean, and dance through your kitchen. So rough, so graceful. Cherry pits and juice, I’m covered in new freckles. Crushed ice freezes teeth.

The softest music, the loudest people. Baby how I miss those days.

Stroll down spring sidewalks, we head to the grocery store. Green liberation.

Ode to the Bearded Boy i. On July 31st there is a rare blue moon and you ask me to meet you on the deck at 1:00am. We lay there and listen to that playlist I made titled slow and talk about the time you went stargazing in the Israeli desert and some story you love called “the egg.” When my teeth start to chatter you cup my fingers between yours and whisper into the gaps until our palms get sweaty (and even then you don’t let go.) Sometimes you will forget what you want to say next and things will get quiet (not that I would rather lay next to anyone else’s silences.) I can still see you, glowing under the blue moon, lips parted so as if you might swallow it whole. It’s those types of moments you don't forget. ii. Have you ever had so much trouble sleeping that you decide to get out of bed to make a cup of peppermint tea and draw a warm bath? You might dip your toes in, ever so slowly, before submerging yourself all at once. When the water reaches past your neck, you close your eyes and blow bubbles underneath with your nose—so silently, so purposely, as if you want to drown yourself but not quite. I guess what I’m trying to say is I miss you. iii. Sometimes I only kiss you in my dreams. When I tell you this, you ask me to open my eyes and when I do, I see you laying next to me, naked and holy, so gentle and pure that it’s almost as if you are here. I wish you were here I wish you were here I wish I could kiss you now.