by Celine Aljamil – Contributor
I met this wide-eyed lion
who blinds my eyes with her light
In her presence my voice thins into a reverberating hum
There is nothing I could say to her that she hasn’t heard
My presence is like a
Blank page or a mirror
She doesn’t shy away from me
I have been with women of many answers
Women who steal pulses from my heart
Sift them with their hands
Then place them on my eyes
And lead me home.
We sat at a café in mindless silence
I waited for her to finish eating pancakes
All plans failed after that
She was changing too fast, and the air was still
I left her there and she has only been polite to me ever since
I have been with women of many answers
Ones who taught me how to pray
Ones who taught me how to kiss
I ask her what does it take to meet God?
A room full of incense
Minimalist furniture
Arabic calligraphy on the wall
What does it take to get kicked out of God’s room?
Purple hair
Skipping a few kisses to the mat
Forgetting the candle on
If I carry the candle to the bar and bring it back
Is it still God’s candle? Has God ever entered a bar?
Does it suffocate you, the smell of the bar in God’s candle?
let me lick my finger and turn its flicker off
Then lick my burnt finger and flick my lover’s breast
Her flame is balm
I have been with women of many answers
I met a woman that learned to subdue
And another that wrote whole timelines for her children
now I hold my lovers’ hands as they trail behind
I lead the small sidewalk
it’s the only place we can walk
it’s the only way I’ve been taught to love
to engineer the warmth even if my hands get sweaty
treading through claustrophobic horizons
thin lines, they are thin lines
like the way we fall in and out of talking
the way I see her care for others like it’s her profession
the way I kissed her to stop her from talking about other boys
and she thought it was practice
the way the only confrontations I have with my mother
are over the phone
because it can only end with us closing the line
I have been with women of many answers
My presence is like the next page or a single shard
Enough to carry all the lines
Enough to deflect their light