M. Wilder | tromoß / tromos | Glass: A Journal of Poetry

November 2019

M. Wilder

tromoß / tromos

1. a trembling or quaking with fear 2. with fear and trembling, used to describe the anxiety of one who distrusts his ability completely to meet all requirements, but religiously does his utmost to fulfill his duty

everything is under everything else. almond blossoms one moment, and the leaves, like girls, suffocate so beautifully. so it follows that boys love this season. darkness overtakes light even in endless sky. there will not be enough sleep for this. a man takes his sadness and throws it away. but then he's still left with his hands. the world keeps showing me these things. maybe i'm jumping the gun, but then again the world keeps showing me these things. my Lord, scoop my eyes out. fill my ears. darkness overtakes light even in endless sky. there are families whose children will end the year without baby teeth. tell us how to feel our way out of the dark. yet to erase is to remember all over again. we make pillow forts in the bomb shelters and call this place a castle. the silence of girls will vibrate a tidal wave. when ice melts, the cities will drown. loving the world is like watching from the house in the snow: the footprints fill, and erase.

This prayer, a lament, was for the eighteen children, women, and men murdered or injured in the Tree of Life Synagogue hours before I wrote this poem, in fall 2018. Then this was for the wild fires leveling towns and habitats. This was for Christine Blasey, and the girls seeing themselves in her. Antwon Rose and Emantic Bradford Jr, both killed, through their backs, by cops. And the kids with bodies like all of theirs, watching this all happen, within a single season. Fall 2018 felt heavy, and I didn't know how to hold it. And now this is for the thirty+ people killed in multiple shootings yesterday, August 3 and 4. For the children in American concentration camps, too. Their mamas and papas. William Van Spronsen. And it doesn't stop here. Living is a constant practice in locating inner and cultural peace, grace, and love, while balancing responsibility with memory — and sometimes temporarily forgetting the devastation; How and when is such erasure self-preservation or hope, and is this acceptable at all? I referenced both poet Richard Siken (the italicized couplet "a man takes his sadness…"), and Lawrence Weschler, a photographer juxtaposing images to imply connections: "The world keeps showing me these pictures," he said. These references encapsulate my experience of embodying sadness and secondhand trauma in our current world; Once it is felt, I cannot rid myself of this knowledge, and this knowledge impacts the way I perceive other people or public spaces, based on tragedies I have seen. Harboring the world within our brains and bodies, we cannot relate to ignorance's bliss any longer. I'm not sure I'd want to. Everything reflects everything else. Often I find myself guilty, or afraid, that I am becoming someone I don't want to be: someone angry — and unable to trust (mostly of fellow white folks and cis men.) But yet again, "the world keeps showing me these things." How can I not place experiences side by side? How many times can my heart break? How do I remember the sun is always rising somewhere? I cannot sleep this feeling off. So I write poems. I ask how can we feel and resist our way out of this. I make pillow forts, find books for children at the library, and attend endless protests. I listen to the stories, and the silences too. I process, and I try to amplify the voices made quiet. And these, too, are all prayers, with all my fear and trembling.

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