FUBAR

I gave my song to a scared and wounded soldier. He thought my song was a gun. He took my song to war and it was killed in battle. Now the weight of this defeat has penetrated the rules of my body. Penetration is the melody I lost. Your lips are the melody I hear in my sleep. Your lips would rather kiss a mouse than a butterfly. Aim higher. Like the songs that are written on your bones. The freedom songs. The redemption songs. Don’t tell me you’re not good enough. I have tasted the thoughts that live inside your mouth. I have traced the life in the lines of your shoulder blades. Let me press my hands to your temples and feel the rhythms. Yours and the ones that echo from your father’s drum. He is the master of this war. Taught you how to point your weapons at the ones who love you most. Stand back or I’ll shoot he says. Like father like son. Everything you want from him is everything I want from you. Funny how that happens. Underestimation is the opposite of penetration. Sound is the opposite of rejection. Remember you can choose your own legacy. Si vis amari, ama. Would it make it easier if I told you I know how you feel? It’s hard to keep fighting when all you want to do is sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star to the one who left you in the trenches. Singing changes the way you breathe. Breathing changes the way you feel. Fathers change the way you love. Fear changes the way you live. Living changes the way you penetrate the body. Penetrating the body changes the way you penetrate the soul. Going to war changes everything and when everything changes nothing survives unless both sides surrender. I offered to surrender everything to you. I laid my song at your feet. You thought my song was a gun. You took my song to war and it was killed in battle. Now I live differently in my body. I live differently in my soul. I sleep with a white flag in my hand. I dance with a bullet in my chest. I wait for this war to end. I wait for you to come home. I wait for a day that will never be born. I wait.


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