Eloy Morales
His Last
Mistake
I am the creator's last mistake. You can see his trembling hand in the bruises on my face. I am holding on to the edges of reality like the sheet that never gets changed on the bed where no one sleeps. I have found the room that’s always locked. I turn to dust and crawl under the door. I find a way to pass the time, cursing the hours until the cold embers become shadows in the corners of my face. I am treading in the shadows, and the naked furniture is only a memory. I cut my shin on the edge of sleep. I am sleepless now. I am barely here. I cry out to God to embrace me in his filthy hands, but my voice is a dull pencil. I am lucky to be alive.
Ruby Red
Flags
I didn't want to break his heart. That wasn't my intention. Of course, everything I do makes that a lie. The heartbreaking is just so inevitable. I try to warn them ahead of time, but they rarely listen. I think there's something wrong with my face. It makes the men I love go deaf. I can't take responsibility for their deficits. And this last one was the worst. He knew things. I don't know how he crawled inside of me, but once he was there he went through the cupboards and stomped the cellar. Before I knew it, he knew everything. He found the red marks and the scars. He found the things that make me laugh. The illnesses. All of them. He told me that he didn't want me to change. That he was attracted to all of the things that were crooked and bent. I made a home for him. I made myself into a home. He said we would live comfortably. He told me that he would gladly fix the sink if it leaked or defrost the fridge when it needed it. I cleaned the bathroom for him. I knew I liked him when I got down on my knees and cleaned the tub. My mind was a home, and he was my tenant. I gave him a key. I showed him the complicated code to crack into the center of me, but it seemed as if he already knew the numbers. He had unlocked the safe and found the pile of overdue library books. He brushed away all the letters that had gathered on the floor just inside the front door. He might have read them all. I don't know. But for some reason I didn't mind. He certainly had my number. He pushed it. He pushed them all. I was a canvas of red flags that he chose to ignore. Flags as red as the ruby red of my red red ruby red lips.
Cornhuskers
I don't know what has or has not been planted. I can't pay attention to that. My family is connected to the earth. I think my mother might have grown from the earth. I know my father eats dirt when no one's looking. They are farmers. I don't know where I came from. I assume that I fell out of a sunflower. I can't have been born like my brothers and sisters. I am smack in the middle. There are so many above me and so many below me, and all of them care about the same crap. All of them dress the same way and like to watch football on Saturdays. The Cornhuskers. I can't breathe when they watch football. I can't eat the food that they eat. I can't hear their voices “stumble and bumble.” The noise of the television makes me insane. On Saturdays, I find myself out in the fields. Alone. I hate the fact that we destroy everything we grow. We turn it into money. We turn it into mortgage payments. We turn it into wet jars. The cellar is full of jars. Cans we buy, and jars we fill. There might as well be blood in each of them. I know it's my mother's blood in those jars. I've seen her bleed for the jars. And my father and my brothers carry them into the house. They pile them up and then we empty them. Eventually. Then it starts all over again. It's life. On Sundays we go to church, and the fat pastor tells us that we should love each other. We shake hands. We welcome each other into Jesus. We do his dirty work. He's too fucking lazy. Where are you, Jesus? Show your face. You're definitely not that wooden white man hanging over the organ pipes. I know that. Jesus would have been brown like Bobby Jenkins who goes to my school. He sits next to me in every class because our names are almost the same. He's been my friend since we were four. He's a good looking young man. He's got brown sugar for eyes. I love Bobby Jenkins the way my brothers love the Cornhuskers. I could spend every Friday night watching Bobby run around the football field. He's a good athlete, too. Cliché but it's true. I'm happy to call Bobby Jenkins my boyfriend even if he doesn't know it. But I know he knows it inside. He's known it for a long time. I don't think we're allowed to be in love. If he were a stalk of corn, he could love me. And I could love him back. My sisters love corn. They appreciate it. Everyone in my family appreciates what we do. Except for me. I'm a selfish little bitch. And according to the pastor, I'm a sinner. Now the pastor's never used that word in front of me, but I know what he thinks. He’s called boys like me “sinners.” Boys who like boys. The funny thing is I don't think anyone's really hates me. I think they mean it when they shake hands and say good morning. It's about the rows. When you plow the fields, you've got to stay straight. You've got to stay in the rows. You've got to do it in a way that makes sense. I stand up there and sing with the choir, and I know my voice is special. It's precious. I see the way they look at me. All of a sudden they're all Bobby Jenkins. And we stand in rows. The pews are in rows. Everything's organized in Nebraska. The way the football players line up on the field. The assembly line my mother creates when she's filling those jars with everything that we're going to consume all winter long. And my father has the big chair. That'll be his chair until he dies. I don't know who will sit in it when he's gone, but I know that when my daddy's at work I sit in his chair. I smoke his pipe. I don't give two shits about the Cornhuskers. Fuck the Cornhuskers. When I think of football, all I can think of is Bobby Jenkins running around with his tight pants and no shirt. And then I push my daddy’s chair all the way back and have me a good time for the only 10 minutes I'm ever alone in this house. For the only 10 minutes I'm ever alone… period.
What it’s
Like
to be
Great
I cut through water. I make myself a blade that slices from one end of the pool to the other. I flip and do it all over again, being just as dangerous going back the other way. No one gets hurt, but I break their hearts. They are not going to beat me. Not here. Not when the water’s wet. Because once I'm wet, I am a weapon. I no longer inhabit the body you see. I become something that can tear the water apart. And even though water has no reason to be scared of me, I believe it is. I think when it sees me standing above it, it is afraid. I doubt it feels that way with any of my competitors. As good as my competitors might be, they are not danger. They do not whisper into the ear of the water and tell it that it will soon submit. It will be destroyed. It's almost as if I’m part water. Like one of my parents was made out of water. Like my father was the Atlantic or my mother was the Dead Sea. I don't know. It's hard to tell because they don't talk to me. They drove me to all my meets, and they sat in the stands and watched me win but I think they thought early on it was bad luck to talk to me. I spent a lot of time alone. And the only friend I think I have is the water. But instead of cultivating a friendly camaraderie, I became the water's bully. I made enemies with the water. I turned the water into my whore. I didn't care. Medal after medal. Trophy after trophy. I stood on the podium practically naked, and I ignored the crowds who seemed afraid to stare at me. This is what it's like to be great. It's something similar to being dead. People are afraid to say your name. It turns out there are a lot of other things to talk about besides you even though you know you can swim faster than they can spit or speak.
Earth
I don't care how loud the Sun is or how wet the ocean gets. I am the Earth. Measured against those two opponents, I may not seem as strong, but I am the home of the only thoughts in the universe. Without me and my mud and my continents, there would be no people. The sun would burn for nothing. Hot or cold, up or down, there would be no one to notice. The ocean would be empty except for those useless fish. And I'm much better looking. I'm prettier than the moon. Although the moon does have a certain charm, it borrows all its beauty. It's a thief. I am original. You can touch me. You can sleep on me. In me. Many living things do. You can bury your dead in me. Or you can find the hidden water so that your whole village can survive. Look at me. I'm delightful. You can smear me anywhere, and I become the thing I cover. I can be heavy or dangerous. I can be silly and fun. I spin and churn. It’s up to you! I mean what could be better? And there isn't a part of me that doesn't affect you. I am ubiquitous. I am between your toes. You can scrub and scrub, but you’ll never get clean of me. You are homeless without me. I hold your feet to my face and let you wander all over me. What else could you call my feelings for you but love?