ULTRAVIRIS
Natalie-Rose Nathan
My Only
Begotten
I want to give birth to a rose. Nine months seems long, but imagine how it would fill the delivery room with fragrance. The doctor would be astounded to see the rose coming out of me. She would bloom in her hands. I would open my legs and blossom. The nurse would warn me to mind the thorns, but why would I care? Even if they prick me, I would smile and cry. I would want to hold my rose in my arms and name her. I would call her Mae. I wouldn't tell her father that there had been a child. She has only one father, and he will watch her from high in the sky. Our rose would nurse in a white trellis over the fence in my garden. She wouldn’t have to walk or speak. Her coming of age would happen in seconds. She lifts her thoughts to the sky, and I marvel. A miracle of delicate impermanence. Her fingers and toes would stretch into the earth, and her face would meditate. I would make her my Jesus. I would abandon my bible and the codes that have always confused me. Her dormancy would be a resurrection. There would be no crucifixion with the torment of the crowds or the betrayal of a friend. I have faith. Her death is not a death. My christ child would be so much grander than the one in scriptures. She wouldn't waste her time with money lenders or bringing back the dead. She would just be beauty. A testament. She would squat like buddha, day and night. Even when I wasn't looking at her, I would know she was there. I imagine Jesus was dirty with rough hands because he was a carpenter. My rose is not a carpenter. She is a flower. She blooms. Her petals yellow and slowly fall from her body. But no one is stabbing her in the side with a spear. No one is watching her suffocate. When she dies she does a favor to us all. It is her last supper, but her body is not our bread nor her blood our wine. Her body is a feast for the earth. There is no tomb. There is no stone to move. Like her, I feel that I am reborn every spring because her birth and my life will always be connected. She is my embrace. She is not a nail in a cross. Even her thorns, though they cut me when she was coming out, are not that sharp. They are not a crown on her head. The blood they draw is mine. They reach out from her body as a warning to anyone who would lose faith. She is of the earth, my only begotten daughter. And her scarlet cheeks look up to heaven. I am humbled. I behold my daughter, and my soul opens with hers forever. Amen.
Shadows
I do not know what has happened to your shadow. Is it like Peter Pan's? Has it come unattached? It's difficult to say because you are not taking up that much space. Maybe it's you. Maybe you are not enough to cast a shadow. Maybe you need to think more. To breathe more. To hurt more. Because these are the things that give us weight. I see that you are barely covered. Almost naked. You are a creator. You let things drop out of you. You give up the things inside of you. Maybe that has made you too light to have a shadow. You're barely taking up space. I don't think you're even touching the ground. My problem is that even a feather has a shadow. Even a speck of dust. Are you not a speck of dust? You weren't created from the earth, after all. Remember you were a rib. You were somebody else's problem until you became your own, and when you became a real problem no one was thinking to solve you. You were simply there. A mirror. A place to sit and rest. Someone to share the burden. And when I say “share,” I mean carry. Because your source was a frivolous man. He named everything, but what was the point? He was pointless. He could never die. Who cares? Who looks at their shadow when they are never going to die? You were brought into a world that was brutally perfect. There was no contrast. There was no good or evil. Without the contrast, what is there? Maybe this is not your fault, this lack of a shadow. Maybe you should blame him. Or blame Him. There's a theme. Do you see it? Do you see where the blame is? It's fairly obvious to anyone with eyes. And you have two. I can see you have eyes. They barely blink. You ate away at the apple because somebody had to fix the problem. It was a delicious problem, to be honest. You can still feel it sitting in your stomach. And suddenly there was contrast. That's when he noticed that you were beautiful. How could you have been beautiful before when there wasn't anything ugly? He knew you were beautiful because he felt ugly. Because he could see the contrast. He could see how things were different between the two of you. He cast a shadow now. It was ugly and heavy and black. It was like a sickle. Or a shovel. And it dug into the earth. It made a grave because now he would need one. He would be buried one day. And so would you. Maybe there's no shadow because you're so far up off the earth. Because you are standing on his shoulders and your shadow is over his. Because now he is a ladder. He is a tool. He is utilitarian, and you use him to reach the highest colors in the sky. You paint the earth with colors that matter because there's a difference between red and blue. A difference between black and white. What sort of God wouldn't have made these things? But maybe He knew. Maybe you're not the sinner. Maybe that's why you don't have a shadow because you are the light. And light doesn't cast a shadow. Light just shows us the way.
Eyes
No one can see me. I have gone from the beginning of the day until the end without opening anyone’s eyes. I don’t look in the mirror. I just go about my business and do the things that I'm supposed to do. I pour the coffee. I take a walk. I spend a few moments in the shower cleaning everything that was dirty. When I'm done, I won't see the results. I will dry myself and dress myself and find a moment to tell my stories to myself. I have to have faith that I’m clean. And then one day, there is you. Now, I cannot be unseen. Your eyes don’t stop seeing me. I want it. I want you to see me. You are a tabernacle. You are a church. You are mass with every last candle lit. You are the choir at full voice. And we can all bend our heads and pray to you because you deserve it. Is there anything divine on earth? I look at you now, and I say “yes.” I know that there is a sunset. I know that there are trees that give up their leaves and let them die. Their death is the collage of color that comes with Fall. When the choir sings at full voice, they pretend that they are singing up to God. But I know that anytime the choir sings they are actually singing to you. Because God is a mystery. God is fiction. But your two eyes are facts. Look at them. I can kneel in the aisle and pretend to pray to the son of God. But what I'm really doing is thinking about how much I would like to lean into you. Kiss your closed eyes that flicker with their earnest wishes. Like prayers. Like a promise. Like a confession to a priest who is eager to hear every last thing that I have to say.
Pink
Exhibition
What have you done? What have you chosen from the universe to be the reality that we will live? She is perfect and so are they. I have heard them make their noises in the morning when they first wake up. I know why they are pink. You give us a diet of silhouettes instead of a diet of noise. And because I have seen you, I know the dark is a diet that you know well. It’s like mousetraps. When one goes off they all go off. The shadows have their way of communicating. She can see this, of course, but she refuses to use her head. She is headless, after all. But that shouldn't stop her from thinking. Or dreaming. And the pink feathers that flutter and splash aren't enough to make her feel like a girl. It was a lie. The color. The bedroom that they made so pink like flamingos. But sometimes when you look closely, flamingos aren't really pink. They're dirty. That's why she comes here. Because they know a truth that she knew but could not say. Her room was not pink. She was not pink. She was dirty. It wasn't from thinking about sex of course. She did that. It was about being human before she was a girl. Because she was always human first. She did human things first. And humans are dirty. What animal isn't? And she made her noises, too. She had her complaints. She ate her protests when the eyes got hard and didn't stop staring. She learned that she was not supposed to make noise. That's why the birds fascinate her. They don't seem to care. In fact they seem desperate. Their voices are anguished. This isn't where they're supposed to be either. This isn’t their habitat. The exhibit doesn't fit them. They have a wildness somewhere that is missing them, but they'll never see it again. Because they are here for her to see. And she shuts her mouth and looks at them. And when they cry, she doesn’t have to.
As a Curse
Everyone knows that the silhouette is you. We can see it. It's not beautiful, tough. It doesn't draw the eye. Is that a dress? A coat? Is she wearing slacks? Is her hair long? These are things that might be enough to get a glance but no one's going to gawk. That’s why you’re happy. It's like a hole in the earth through which you can escape the misery of yourself. Because you have been released from your color and your definition. Even your voice is unheard. You’re happy to be flat and black. There's no heart beating. There's no blood racing. There's no heat. No fire. There's just the outline of you. And that's finally enough. Because you've been on this earth long enough. Not long, but long enough. Flashlights were everywhere. Flashlights that would wake you when you were sleeping and find you when you were hiding. They saw you saw you as a curse. They would raise their voices at you. There was no outline. There was skin. It wrapped around you and glowed. How are you to live if every flashlight blinds you and makes your mouth afraid to speak? So you became a silhouette. A shadow. It's better now this way because after all the sun doesn’t shine 24 hours a day. Sometimes you get to disappear. Sometimes you can actually fall asleep.
Live in It
I fill the glass with water. I pull the chain and the light hums. My night time is lit with your talent. I can see the things on my table because you have taken the time to make them. I am blue because that is the color you have chosen. My shadows are hash marks that you created. I can feel your hand on the brush dipping it in colors that calm me. Ready for sleep. And yet there's just a bit that's not quite ready. You're not quite ready. You want to switch off the light and let the sleeping begin, but it can't. I have tried to close my eyes, but your talented fingers won't let me. You won’t let me let go of the lamp or the glass or the mug that's filled with something that I would rather drink than let go undrunk. I'm sorry that I have corrupted this perfect painting because I don't know if you wanted me to live in it. But since I first saw it, I can't help myself. I know the color. I know the prayer. I know the sheer curtains that have been dancing in night breeze. I have crashed your painting. I promise I'll make the bed. But for now I will sleep with the painted window open. I will listen to the things that you have not painted but maybe one day will. Because out there in the world are so many things that your eyes have not seen. I know that what you see you can make real. Look at me, please. Thank you, sweet painter. Good night.