SUBMISSIONS

Submissions are accepted on a regular basis, year-round.
Can include, short stories, essays, poetry and prose.
Must not exceed 3,000 words.
Must be written by a current ESA student, or alumni.
Submissions are accepted: e.s.say.says@gmail.com

Wednesday 28 October 2015

Insomnia Days, Fitful Rest, and Overstuffed Flesh by Maria Granich


I've lain awake for years on end, connected to the fuzzy glow of television and my many feline companions that have purred and died by my side.
I've eaten decades worth of tomatoes, roasted and burned and brimming with their timeless juices; every night, a tomato.
Strange lamb, like an odd pied piper you've followed my feet, bayed at my thighs and left me to wander the endless stretch of meadows plagued by the white flowers: acacia, sureau, elderflower, jasmine.
O Holy Ghost, you've given me the gift of truth. It burns in my chest, coal-smolders, and aches so deep and so great my heart breathes to communicate it to any fool who'll listen.

For all these sleepless years, there has been an honest haze. Me and the haze, sharing an eight square meter apartment, sharing the toothpaste, sharing the air. We spent every night tip toeing and praying not to notice each other. A silent blessing for it's spoken curse. One night the haze took residence in my ribcage. One night the apartment was empty. One night the haze settled into my eyes my nostrils my limbs and so I became it and it became me and we were we and that was that.

Every part of me is half finished. I am spilled ink on paper. I am Frankenstein's masterpiece. I hobble on one leg with an ungodly limp and babble endlessly about life's awe, the sinful beauty that makes it unbearable. Up against the abusive haze and ache, the awe is a timid and tentative serpent with a double edged tongue. The vindictive mistress. The one who poisons the apothecary.
In the heavens, the awe and  I will dance and sing on hot coals for eternity onward, and of course, no rest.

No comments:

Post a Comment