Chandra Persaud
WHEN MY LOVE FATHERS A CHILD THAT IS NOT MINE
It is a leap year. My fourth-grade teacher said
magical things happen when an extra day is
added to a year. None of it feels like magic,
but just like that the phone calls stop coming in
and his toothbrush disappears from the bathroom sink.
My bed doubles in size. I have more drawers than
I know what to do with. Just like that my house
is overtaken by one restless monkey. It swings from
limb to limb, stealing pounds of my flesh. Eighteen
years fall off my frame in a matter of weeks. With it,
my dreams of a red car and a house on a hill
not too close, not too far from my mother.
My grief nips and gnaws at my insides; I
swear if someone cuts me open not a thing would
fall out. At night, I think of Goddess Sita who
begged the Earth to split open and swallow her, to
release her from an unjust life. I think if divinity
cannot bear love’s bitterness, how do I? I have an
aunt whose insides frothed at the mouth when
love betrayed her. My grandmother could never
say her name without marble eyes. In a recurring dream,
my love descends a concrete staircase into a raging body
of water. I follow close behind. The water whips my feet.
I beg him to slow down. He never does. My braid comes loose
in the breeze. I lift my eyes to the sky. My body turns
into white blossoms and vanishes into the sun.