Sometimes, I lunge toward
people out of the blue, grasping
at the trunks of their bodies
the way a drowning man reaches for a life
raft, wrapping my limbs around
any available body part
like a starving constrictor.
Those times, noise becomes loud and distant,
mangling together to form an
incoherent burble like the clang of an
inexperienced cymbal. The ground unsteady
under my feet, the world spinning
on its axis and
leaving me behind with a strange
sense of vertigo. If I blink,
don’t grab unto something and
leave my mark, then
I will disappear, evaporate
into tiny mists of nothing
that escape into the atmosphere,
without anyone knowing.
In those precious seconds,
the only thing that anchors
me solidly is the feeling of
another’s acceptance. To
have me clutch at them
and still smile and hug me,
accepting me though
they do not know why,
saving me with the
ignorant carelessness
someone placing a fallen bird
up high where the cats
won’t get it, when it was afraid
of getting trampled by unwary feet.
Recently, it comes more often, but
I just stand there and let
the sensation crash over me,
letting me sway gently in
this invisible power that only I
know and seem to feel. I close
my eyes, relax my body, and
submit, only re-entering
the world when the feeling fades.
Not quite because I am trying to fit
in, but because the tingle
that subsumes me no longer
inspires fear and desperation,
but a deep seated longing to
no longer
matter.
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