Dayna A. Gross

Quickly!

I was born a sensitive and calm child. No one taught me babies cry when they awaken, so I remained silent. My parents were delighted every time they peaked into my bedroom to find me awake, “This one never cries when she awakens,” they would say w/ pride.

I was not taught their language yet. They sounded as foreign to me as moo’ing cattle.

I was born a sensitive and calm child, but my mother was selfish and I absorbed her nature because she was ma-ma and I was girl while the rest of the world were dangerous uncaged zoo animals.

I was born a sensitive and calm child soothed by a selfish nurture and now love with a selfish nature.

I was born a sensitive and calm child, when people try to speak to me all I hear is: Baaaaaah.

NEVER CHANGE

NEVER CHANGE
NEVER CHANGE NEVER CHANGE
NEVER CHANGE
NEVER CHANGE. NEVER CHANGE
NEVER CHANGE

NEVER CHANGE never change never change
Never change
Never cha-nge never change ne-ver change never-change never change.

Never change, neverchange nivir chanj
Never chainj
Never chains
Never change-, never chang.e
NEVER CHANGENEVER CHANGE
NEVER.CHANGE
NEVER CHANG:
NEVER; CHANGE
NEVER CHANG
CHANGE NEVER CHANGE NEVER
CHANGE
NEVR CHANGE
NEVER CH-NGE. N-V-R CHANGE. NVR CHNAGE. EVER CHANGE.

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Future. Womb. Country side. Horse. Mental. Cheater. Eyes. Laughter. Contact. Attention. Soft. Return. Humor. Broken. Mundane. Eyes. Ease. Flight. Hotel. Beer. Hike. Summer. Argentina. Chile. Berlin. Writing. Breakfast. Fruit. Peanuts. Commitment. Loyalty. Honesty. Repetition. Love. Heart organ. Heart signals. Imagination. Unforgiving. Maté. Water temperature. Market. Stride. Side by side. Hitch hiking. Alone. Asleep. Left. Distance. Imagination. Wondering. Unknown. Unforgivable. Blasphemy. Friendship. Music. Timing. Outright. Unspeakable. Inaudible. Possibilities. Future. Locked. Loyalty. Promises. Return. Summer. Spring. Flat. Men. Ignored. Heard. Focused. Lightness. Mountain. Rock. Earth. Lake. Dry. Wet. View. Shelter. Bar. Timing. Country. Air. Romance. Unexplored. Again. Again. Possibilities.

Today the objects are frozen

t white tea kettle w t blue and orange-red flowers,
t glass jar, t papers, t books, t plants
Stand unbearably still
If I would slide them off t table one by one, they would descend slowly
Shatter to pieces w a jingle
Like t last guttural sound a lamb releases when more than half its thick red blood has squirted from t slit in its throat and t body jerks automatically but t lamb is lifeless between t eyes, these objects
Shattered to pieces, would too, stare
Back lifelessly w out t prospect of returning

Maybe not t plant
No, most certainly not t plant.

◎

Dayna A. Gross has been published and shortlisted in the Büro BDP Writing Prize 2020 (November 2020), Angel City Review (July 2020), Another Chicago Magazine (June 2020), RHNK (2017), JFKI (2018), Seeing Her Ghost (2017) among other small press publications. She lives in Berlin, Germany where she hosts an experimental poetry radio show called CRYPTOMNESIA, which streams FM in Berlin and Brandenburg.