Merry-Go-Cosmos
We who love merry-go-rounds
Imitate the world as it spins,
We ride to jog those memories
From other, bigger, cosmic lives,
When we were asteroids caught
By gravity, by the center
Of the galaxy.
Say! Remember when
We circled in a larger bowl,
As incarnations of
Galactic clouds in a swirl
Orbiting the universe?
And as the clouds,
Say, do you recall
Riding the 9th dimension as it spun,
We were universes, tall and proud,
Going, going, spinning,
And we jumped!
We flung out into celestial space,
Away from that colossal loop
With a gorgeous, giant bang—
Say! What wonderful worlds
We have made!
Begin to Begun
Why is it the starting of things
that tend to paralyze?
Such as the swinging of legs over the bed,
Or the decision to go traipsing
Across the city’s countryside,
Where the trees and the grass poke through
The sidewalk in pretty little groves?
The middle part is easy, and
Sometimes involves churros from
The vendor on the way,
And even after getting home,
The sunshine warms the face.
But the launching of a doing
Involves Newton’s law of motion,
It needs a force to force it going,
Or it molders in the slogan,
“Tomorrow, tomorrow.”
That charity, that tea shop,
Or just the humble cleaning of
Expired salad dressings
All of them conspiring
at the bottom of the fridge—
How is it that there’s six—?
But how does one start a smile
Without the impetus of bliss,
How can one embark on new love
when the last still haunts the kiss?
Question: when to get up and begin
A faint lifting again,
Where grey reminds of rainstorms
Instead of hospital skin?
Today, today, can we wind up the sun,
Push the thoughts of endings back and
Change beginnings to begun?
To Tip the Scales
They wished to be mermaids -
they didn’t know mermaids were considered sirens,
or that their smiles were invitations
and invitations were forbidden.
Only commanded smiles were heard and the
‘She didn’t know she was beautiful’ kind of girls -
(those girls that tripped
and laughed at bad jokes and needed strong arms).
And the others,
those with tails, and tales to tell,
those who scraped for a raise from the depths
of notetaking and ‘this isn’t an ideas meeting,’
those who wished to be mermaids
were passed over,
to be looked at and touched, but listened to?
Dangerous, that alluring sound,
for beauty was sin to hear and not see.
Those who listened would be drowned and
trapped in a sea of equality,
eaten alive under the waves,
ripped apart by maternity leave, and paving the way
for a statue on Wall Street
of a young siren facing the bull,
hands on her hips,
demanding her future on land and on sea,
singing to tip the scales back
to where she could live
and breathe
and be.
Ode to Crunching Leaves
Drying vines and curled up spines,
Also, spiders, much like balled-up socks,
That stay behind the laundry door—
These things hand out nostalgic grins.
What is it about the end of things
That set our hearts into a spin?
Why is it that the death of leaves
Makes us crunch them underfoot?
Is there a reason? It’s the season
To feel decay give way with a
Joyous release, with longing and
Free speech, and the expiration
Of my father’s admiration—
What is it about the elation
Of short hair after long,
After leaving it so long,
And now both my head and my
Convictions seem so much lighter—
What is it about the end of things
That makes us brighter?
Leaving my curled shoulders, I step
Out of narrowness of mind, and
I stomp on a shrunken leaf.
It crushes with such a lovely sound,
The end of old, dried-up beliefs.
When the Ice Met the Mountain
When the ice met the mountain,
the mountain was surprised.
"When we shouted to each other
at the beginning of the world,
we agreed on two billion years,"
Mountain said. "It's only been one!"
Ice shrugged, sloughing
off a part of her shoulder.
"I've been running early to things.
My river feet are sliding faster,
and I'm leaving more of me behind."
Mountain gazed down at the valley.
Great puddles trailed behind Ice.
"Stay here a while, then," she told Ice.
"Tuck under my arms and stay cold
in my shadow." So, they embraced
for a glittering three billion years,
and Ice in turn protected Mountain
from crumbling to wind or rain or man.
But then the air warmed again, and Ice's
river feet rose to her knees.
She buckled and clung to Mountain in bits,
till the day men rained down two hundred-
thousand fires, and she shrank to a puddle
at Mountain's feet.
"Don't leave me!" Mountain said.
I need your ice in this heat!"
Ice's voice blurred as she evaporated,
rising in the air to Mountain's face.
"Stay as long as you can, Mountain.
The world needs you to look up to,
as I have, all this time."
Mountain cried rockslides down her face
And shouted to the sky,
"Promise to meet me again, however long
it takes, ten billion years,
or a hundred billion more!"
The sky, now part of Ice, whispered back,
"Promise."
Emmie Christie’s work includes practical subjects, like feminism and mental health, and speculative subjects, like unicorns and affordable healthcare. She has been published in Factor Four Magazine, Small Wonders, and Flash Fiction Online, among others. She has also narrated for the magazine Strange Horizons. Find her at www.emmiechristie.com, her monthly newsletter, or BlueSky.
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