Murmuration
undulate
recurrent
brokenness
disassembly
and reassembly
of wounded
kinship
in flight
~
I. Fervor Dream
Nana stirred our deviation into honeysuckle time. It began as soon as she heard the breadth of the setting sun. We reorganized ourselves accordingly. The thread of our everyday choreography swelled, split, refracted. We danced our way into a different order together. She trudged through the front door and waded beneath the looming fruit trees her sister planted for her many years ago, swaying through the yard until she met the edge of the road, which wasn't exactly a river. She was predisposed to listening for the sounds of wounded animals, which inspired long, sonic meditations, during which her feet became ears[1].
Grandmother and I searched for fallen fruit beneath the avocado tree during Nana's momentary absence. Every now and then we'd touch our ears to the ground and listen for Nana's footsteps. We didn't know where she went. She didn't want to be found. We didn't ask because we knew that deformation was one of the conditions of our inevitable reconvening. With bulbous avocados in hand, we moved beneath the night blooming jasmine tree at the far end of the yard and inhaled each other's songs.
A swarm of fleshy, ivory tunnels protruded from pedicels and spread outward into stellar apertures. I picked a little flower and pushed the open end into my ear. Its choir unhinged my jaw. Honey seeped from my grandmother's tear ducts into a hole in the Earth. We dipped our fingertips into the pool and held out our hands for each other to taste. I held the flower I picked up to her lips and she blew out ghostly tufts: dandelion pappus.
When Nana returned, we noticed a pigeon resting between her right palm and her hip. How did she know how to hold wounded birds with such astonishing precision? Grandmother and I danced our way into our usual positions. I moved to get a glimpse of the pigeon while blowing into the aperture of another jasmine flower while she opened the door for Nana and the bird. The pigeon cooed, sounded trills. Nana's attunement to her predisposition and her devotion to these evening walks necessitated our reorganization.
Without hesitation, she walked into the kitchen, turned around, curled her sturdy, tender fingers around the handle carved into the skewed, wooden door and slid it shut. Nobody told me how to dance behind a closed door. I slid back into the living room and hummed a sister rhythm. I knew I wasn't supposed to interrupt Nana while she was with an injured bird, so I calculated accompaniment, keeping an ear out for the pigeon's sweet cooing.
When its sound finally made its way into my ear, I ran toward the kitchen craving enigmatic anomaly. Nana had left the door to the kitchen ajar. A fissure in space summoned loudly: come play. I leaned into the space between the door and the frame. My eyes caught a glimpse of her tired, leather sandals and her beautifully weathered legs. I noticed that the little door to the metal birdcage with the sky-blue, plastic bottom was unhinged. I froze when I laid eyes on the scene. Nana was cradling the pigeon in one hand and stroking its back with the other, while sounding a slow and unintelligible murmur. Her tongue trilled time and mine unfurled, grew outward, touched hers and proliferated, setting a precedent for a lifetime of efflorescent want for sound.
II.
If I retrace your
murmur with
my fingertips
and rub its edges
'til it blurs
I can hear it
sonic bloom
whisper into
the festering wound
inflicted while
cutting us in two
then take this
night blooming jasmine
and rub its buttery
petals around
on my tongue
I heard a crow
c
a
w
i
n
g
a rhythm
this morning
and remembered
your embrace
I wet my teeth
opened my mouth
sounded
new growth through
a proliferate jaw
now we can revel
in no-thingness
incite shift
swerve
ensemble
glide the angular tips
of our wings along
the darkest parts
of the night sea cutting soft slits
into saliva
with feathers
cartilage
and bone
flocking makes
it possible to
lean into
the sharpest pains
of forgetting
just below
the surface
is the swell of
sonic detritus
question:
whose wet mouth is this?
whose want for sound?
billowing recollections
in the throat
gargle ggggggg
with the back of
the tongue
expand chest
push air into
belly and contract
push tongue to
the top of
the throat
cry out in
pelagic shearwater
we only sing at night
when we can
salvage the flock
of the gull
choir's timbre