issue one / serendipity
Self-Portrait as Empty Mirror
MJ Gomez
I wake to the phone ringing. I don’t pick up.
I already know it’s time, mother Time, calling my given name.
Three syllables that rhyme with surrender. Three syllables petrified –
the fossils I keep inside me to seem interesting.
These days, I do nothing with the page but grieve. Three stones
tossed into the lake inside me. The body, forgotten,
flows onto the page despite me. I try to write about America
but it always ends as a portrait of something burning.
You could call it the Sun. You could call it mercy.
As long as something is impossible someone will call it good.
The way a solar eclipse is just another full moon.
The one thing we hold in common with God
is that when our lips touch the world darkens. And we disappear
into each other. Fabric ripping into afterimage.
Folded into joy over bare skin. The love song of the street
is for the burning palace across the horizon
the way surrender is just another admission
of our fragility – which is to say, even this name
can deserve tenderness. The lake, holding itself.
Holding only itself. & the full moon begins to dry.
I already know it’s time, mother Time, calling my given name.
Three syllables that rhyme with surrender. Three syllables petrified –
the fossils I keep inside me to seem interesting.
These days, I do nothing with the page but grieve. Three stones
tossed into the lake inside me. The body, forgotten,
flows onto the page despite me. I try to write about America
but it always ends as a portrait of something burning.
You could call it the Sun. You could call it mercy.
As long as something is impossible someone will call it good.
The way a solar eclipse is just another full moon.
The one thing we hold in common with God
is that when our lips touch the world darkens. And we disappear
into each other. Fabric ripping into afterimage.
Folded into joy over bare skin. The love song of the street
is for the burning palace across the horizon
the way surrender is just another admission
of our fragility – which is to say, even this name
can deserve tenderness. The lake, holding itself.
Holding only itself. & the full moon begins to dry.
< previously published by Arasi Magazine and Cloudy Magazine >
MJ Gomez is a young writer from the Philippines, currently based in Saudi Arabia. Pursuing a Bachelor of Arts in English, they enjoy playing guitar on hot, sleepy days and stargazing through bus windows. Their work is forthcoming or published in Healthline Zine, Verum Literary Press, the Cloudscent Journal, and others. You can find them on Twitter @bluejayverses !