‘Tales from a Place Where You Can Feel All Your Selves Crawling On Your Skin’

Joel M. Scinta is a photographer from Buffalo, NY

Tales from a Place Where You Can Feel All Your Selves Crawling On Your Skin

I wake up building ancient cities in my heads...

one of dazzle

pulling strands from the sun into my fingertips, I enliven the universe. I wake up

with sand in my eyes and dust drifting in beams of light, things falling out of

balance and into place. I wake up to the most beautiful sunrise I’ve ever seen (I’m

pretty sure I imagined it.) I wake up to buildings beamish and brilliant, and a

future built in bone marrow and crystal. Everything I’ve ever wanted is on the tip

of my tongue the tip of my tongue the tip of my tongue so close I can taste it. It

tastes like cardamom. (It tastes like hope.)

and one of decay

shielding my eyes from the insistence of morning, I submit to the weight of my

body. I wake up with sand in my eyes and dust caking my bedroom, things falling

out of place and into balance. I wake up to the darkest nightmare I’ve ever had.

(I’m pretty sure it’s real.) I wake up to buildings stagnant and fixed, and a future

built in splinters and cinder. Everything I’ve ever feared is so close I can taste it I

can taste it I can taste it on the tip of my tongue. It tastes like pennies. (It tastes

like blood.)

One day I tremble and the next I shimmer.

Tales from a home like a pendulum

like a wave

like a moan,

an echo

the person you used to be...

haunting you.

Amelia Clare Wright is a recent graduate of Columbia's MFA program in nonfiction creative writing. She has work appearing in Oyster River Pages, Variant, and The Hunger Journal, among others. She grew up in Baltimore City and now lives in Los Angeles. She is currently working on a memoir about pain and trying to decide if she wants to be a coral reef or a tree when she dies.