BATH & OUR SKIN by Chloe Ellen
BATH
for months I sat in a bath going cold
fingertips pruned prophetically
I’ll be wrinkled & old before
I get out of this
water out
side the sky is soapy
blue & I want to go back
to everything I knew
but nothing waited behind for me
fig on bench rotten
milky shampoo bottles moldy
on my phone texts delivered:
2 months ago
1 month ago
then none
in the breeze the curtain doesn’t sway
anymore just sighs
fabric crumbs diaphanous
white dust tangled hair
clumps lie restless on the tiles
I stand & the silver faucet
reflects my body as a pale ribbon
contorted & warped
sternum ribs shins
bone & skin
a half-read novel plunges in
I peel it from the water
let it drip
pages limp moth wings
words dissolve like salt
I sit on the porcelain edge
I try to read what’s left
OUR SKIN
we sat inside a seashell
the beach was a
husk you opened
your palm
tufts of grass lay in
the meridians &
parallels of your
skin
the voice of my sixteen-year-old self
in my head:
wait, he’s leaving tomorrow?
yeah, i tell her, but it isn’t so bad,
because by now you’re used to letting go.
the waves keep rolling
inside the shell
of my skull, a pearlescent echo
& i wonder if you can hear it
from berlin, or prague, or london.
now it’s just me &
the resonance &
i don’t know if it's the hum
of my blood in my ears or if
it’s something deeper,
something that says
i am here & you are there,
you’re stepping onto the tube,
the doors closing
while i watch sand fall
through
my fingers
grains embed
into the
parallels of my
skin
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