The One Who Drowned

The turn of my shoulders.

The water filling me.

You saw me by the door, coyness embodied. 

Damp curls and eager sweat. A smile snagged on my lips from a day of waiting, my skin warm like a stone under sun 

for you.

Beckoned by your shadow, I approached.

The door closed and the light faded as I willed myself to you.

In your memory it is so.

It has to be so. The countless sculptures

and shrines in my name were

founded on your vision after all, the sprawling city fuelled 

by your heart’s anguish — but what of

my reality? What of the

clenched fists behind my back and

wine in my veins, ready to sing me to sleep once your 

body slumped, heavy and sated. 

Heavy breaths clouded the night and 

you whispered that my blood was sweet;

this is the truth I am burdened to remember.

A truth best kept in silent weeping.

In drowning.

Water coursing through me now. It’s a body more vast than anything I know, boundless in power and force. 

I feel the pull. 

Water everywhere. Quivering mouth and lungs, shaking bones, eyes blown wide. Yet my fear mellows in the silence; 

it is almost tranquil, nurturing. A hand upon my own with

no other want than to be there.

Its ancient body goes through mine. I thought I knew this 

song and dance but death has new notes.

Beyond being inside me, beyond having me, I almost cannot

comprehend the calming stillness. How the fullness accommodates. How I do not have to mind how I step, 

how I kiss, how I beg nor how I fuck. It holds me like 

my mother must have once.

This is the mercy of the Nile.

Sinking is floating.

There is no choking.

Memories sink back into my body. There was laughter once.

Somewhere in the wind, an earthy smell, dirt on my soles

before all the polished floors, the fullness of grapes,

honey of figs. Sweetening me when I craved the sourness

you denied. No sweat of adventure. Only of labour.

The water is the most peaceful darkness.

I slit my life into two

Before the water and after the water.

Death is no triumph,

no saviour, no redemption.

But with filling lungs and a slowing heart,

I can breathe again.