Descent
Night glows gold like blood stains, like first lost
tooth. The crunch of a change: brutal. Begin again.
I hear the slow essence of retraction. It glistens.
This morning I make eggs in bare feet, wilt white
onto windowsill. The slim reap of my body. I’m
seeing faces that aren’t mine in the mirror, some
other me who scabbed and started fresh.
I feel my blood pumping, every heartbeat
the same lonely terror. The eggs cool.
The whole house sighs. I can feel
my nested wandering, the ghost’s
shadow stretching, making moods
that affix. The wind chimes move,
catch shapes I couldn’t see. The noose
of a song slopes, creeks a stair
that wasn’t loose before. I feel
the hollow calling: the hole
in my stomach eating itself.
You want me
to describe my
white cotton
panties, tangled
mass of hair. My
bones. You want
to hear the ways
I opened myself,
let light into vein
and perfect pink.
Here:
The first time I ever opened the door, there was an endless dark.
A sinking deepness that flattened. I mean, when it creaked on
its hinge, the whole house numbed. How do you describe eternity?
How do you live in a place that creases the fold? That swallows it.
McLeod Logue is a poet from Birmingham, Alabama. She received her MFA from the University of North Carolina Wilmington, where she taught creative writing. Her work has appeared in The Southern Poetry Anthology, Volume X: Alabama, West Branch, Blackbird, and elsewhere. You can find her at mcleodlogue.com.
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