Voice

Poem

By Lydia Rae Bush

Little pieces of you in my veins, like shards.

You say, you got me wrong,

and I say, ah, honey, that’s not you, that’s me,

is it my fault,

that I am made up of your pieces?

You, darling, must stay over there, all surprise and breathing,

all eternity’s discovering.

All choices and agendas that can leave me behind.

When god made Adam out of Eve’s rib,

I think she bled for a while,

cried while her ink spilled birthing a child

Adam thought was a song, when it was a poem, honey.

When you were the same thing I was,

I wanted you to stay, not disappear,

because what is this thing we are but human

instead of redundant? We’re each our own person,

and my love for you (did you know your love for me)

loves to let our loves morph each other's loves

until we love everything, and when it loves us back,

we will be in its pieces. And we will see ourselves everywhere,

not even you, or me, but us, and honey,

it’ll be a thousand births and rebirths,

our connectedness together

connected to everything.

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Lydia Rae Bush is a poet exploring themes of embodiment and social-emotional development. Rae’s work is Best of the Net nominated and appears in publications such as Vocivia Magazine, Corporeal, and Sage Cigarettes Magazine. When not writing, Lydia can be found singing and dancing, especially in bed when she is supposed to be going to sleep. Lydia’s chapbook Free Bleeding is forthcoming with dogleech books.