artwork: bonnie t. summers Inside Out
(How Body Psychotherapy Feels)
by Bonnie T. Summers
Inside out. That’s what happens when my eyes make U-turns, take off on a roller coaster ride down the spine. I become a 35-foot diameter Deep Tunnel project, overflow, then wait, empty. My face unravels. Seismic waves echo through honeycomb chambers, evaporate. Bones rearrange like Tinkertoys. Familiar handrails disintegrate into grotesque cartoons. I turn inside out, I tell you!
I discover that I have been speaking in binary code.
Snakes enter and emerge from my pores
my hips are glass—shatter; steel—corrode;
become the moon—give birth to lava, flame and smoke
my heart turns inside out, welt exposed,
its rhythms, wet and loud, demand to feast on presence vital organs dazzle, now turquoise, gold, malachite I braid myself together, tie my ankles with ribbons, walk through funhouse mirrors
climb up the drops of water that form Victoria Falls two by two Thunder and Lightning Parents shrink, shrink until they are wisps I send far away,
like this: wh—!
I descend on a double helix exhale, secure on my own DNA All I want is a carnie there, someone who takes on sleaze and rats,
knows the gears grips the switch brings me down ready
shows me to the next ride All I need is a ticket and to step into the red car.
~ first published in After Hours
