An Open Faucet

Body

I wish I can explain it as vividly as I can,

but I hope your eyes don’t limit this sight.

Life isn’t all black and white,

trust me,

vision is beyond it,

wavelengths with no light.

It’s veins with no skin,

and lightning with no sky.

It’s interweaving summer dresses

and a crooked smile.

It’s weird birthmarks and sun kisses,

colorful scars from built stitches.

It’s all what’s inside.

It’s a kidney and a heart,

and thoughts with neurons pulled apart.

Like pastry that crumbles between your fingertips,

merging seamlessly with your fingerprint.

Can you envision it?

You see, it’s not something to be said,

it’s built cloud of endorphins that shroud your head,

senses consumed by moments,

structure made by the butterfly effect.

Like a big nose and gaps in your teeth,

imperfections that reflect what’s underneath.

Discoloration that gives you dimension,

like a moving painting,

You provoke thought.

You demand attention.

Only few are lucky,

to stand out from the strands of conformity,

You resemble all what have been seen differently.

Just turn off the switch,

stand in front of a mirror,

and you will see

that you already are what you’re meant to be.

*

Rest

Dumbfounded by the being in front of me,

my tongue fails to explain how something as simple as a piece of skin stirs my insides and lifts me up.

You see,

I am built from of a broken family and a clumsy tongue,

an awkward piece filling space,

but I look at you and I wonder

how a compilation of flesh that breaks and bleeds

try to be the skin that serves and heals?

I’d wrap myself around your bones,

they fit with mine, they’re warmer clothes.

While your fingers are fixated on faults,

I’d give up my shoulders for your head,

I’d do anything to help you rest.

I know your jumbled machinery is twisting,

filling your head with incompetence,

monsters of imperfections,

algorithms built to tell you inefficiency is unacceptable.

Playing kaleidoscopes of slips,

amplifying voices, while they break your knees,

you listen intently.

You welcome them within a house that wasn’t built to hold such harshness.

I’d open you up and dump you onto me,

to hush these voices from making you believe

that you’re anything like them.

As lies blabber filling your head with a thick fog until your eyes get covered,

I wish to let you see the reflection in my eyes.

To see my truth,

to see the roaring undercurrent of your pupils.

To see your confusion,

to help you think,

to help you see what it means to be human,

seeing nothing but skin and bones that can’t hold what’s in your head,

you’re ordering a piece of skin and chains of muscle to hold up gears and lead.

You’re letting nuances amplify till they break you down,

you’re limiting your mind in small quarters and confines.

Give yourself room to breathe.

Stop pulling strings onto yourself.

Dump yourself onto me 

and rest.

*

Fog of flaws

Blindfolded by the scars on your skin,

by the void you caged within.

Slaughtered by dreams of you fading,

by the hands of the light you're afraid to let in.

Prodded by stings of flaws

caged by overkilled faults

As you started to dance,

your song was off beat

your allure felt weary of your clumsy feet.

You were blinded,

misguided,

walking with strings sewed to your hands and feet

making the monsters snatch your heartbeats.

Control your twitches, your vocal strings, your every step,

they planted their seeds in your head

You buried your burden,

the seeds were nothing but rust,

they grew gracefully in your garden,

ashes turned to fairy dust.

You threw the stars that lived between your fingers to the sky

the darkness felt bittersweet with the madness that swung by

they made the page turn warm when it was bleak and alone

they gave the clock a nudge to sway when it was frozen

They made words and paragraphs feel like home,

The floor lifted, as it was falling

Symphonies would roll off your lips

may they be the first to lure my ears

with demoted sighs and small sips, in between.

I see colors rupturing at the seams

As I watched, the lights of the stage grew luminous,

brighter

Your steps made violins sing emphatically,

You were a play writer

You were sightless, and your anthem was the stick

A Houdini of the night, subdued by black magic

You turned the thread that you walked on thick,

you're unaware of your tricks

You brought things to life as you slept,

As you wavered, your aurora uncovered

A supernova at your best

Absentmindedly painting pictures,

While cursing at the sun that forgot to shine

you were the moon and the stars,

drawing constellations in the night.

*

Hollow

Undefined colors lurk out, screaming.

They squint,

it's hard for their eyes to adjust to the unfamiliar light you've held inside.

So they ambush you with ropes

They trap you in a hole,

with all the lines that hold you in.

For I,

The uncertain whisperings thrilled me.

I couldn't help but listen.

I couldn't help but question.

I couldn't stand but doubt the stillness.

I've only heard echoes and I couldn't hear a single voice,

They were overcast with sacrilege.

Obliged to leave me in a box,

I couldn't handle the relentless paradox.

I didn't want to believe that things can be demeaning,

they can ferociously twist shoulders to make them to lose their meaning.

Till we're nothing but machines.

But empty mindless bodies.

Till we let our lies define us,

And the truth will lose its way to ever find us.

Till we're nothing but a punchline,

an abandoned minute in the name of time.

There they'll sit,

the shadows of what we could have been,

mocking us with sweet irony.

For we are naked,

we have no names,

we have no faces.

Our abstract bodies have been dehumanized,

In this box that we're hemmed in.

I'm sorry, I can't fit your archetype,

I can't sell my soul for skin.

Marwa Alqatari is a Computer Science student from Qatif, Saudi Arabia who has found solace and a voice through writing.