Subject to Dust
by Ronald Dzerigian
After our discussion of childhood traumas, once
we’ve revisited a town in this valley named
Yettem (Armenian for Eden), you press your back against my chest.
Our Yettem is here, my hand runs from your ribs across
your stomach; I envision
the bodies of Yettem’s 211 residents
huddled in their beds in the fog, unseen from airplanes, untouched
by light. I trace the light
stubble of your pubic hair with the tips of my fingers; I see the long
stretches of road that lead
from point to point in this valley, that need signs that say subject
to dust. I think about the similarities between dust
& fog, &
we are covered by our own sheets of fog. I am the recipient
of your condensation; I feel your mouth open
against the gentle pressing
of my thumb. We are breathing fog & releasing it from its duty—
to blind those in its fold—
& as you lead me into you
I hold your hand against your thigh in a freezing of time. We
are quiet. We see our hidden futures
behind the eyelids of our sleeping children. You
move to take me entirely, after I bite
your shoulder, in the blinking out of porchlights,
after I cup your breast, inside the admittance
of our limits—the dismantling
of our ideas of limits. After our mouths turn toward each other, we
kiss as if we can only be fed from us. Our
Yettem undoes itself from a wreath of clouds.
Image: @helgafo / stock.adobe.com
