The Countdown of a Person

The Countdown of a Person

By Kelly Grace Thomas

I am learning to count again.

Count the parts of me,

parts I count like earthquaked sea glass,

or broken down car parts left to junkyard surrender.

Between the sheets, we know the risk of cursive,

but write left-handed decisions for this tug of war newscast.   

I count them like, in pairs,

like buttons looking to fasten the stained glass to the story that inspired. 

Ten: my eyes,

they are a symphony of conversations

that have yet to find borders.

I’m not sure if this levee built on paper clips and rusted out staples

will hold this storm when the temperature drops.

Nine: my heart,

like Buddhist penguins, with bowed heads to a melting empire,

they know extinction like paper mache,

each moment dripping before the color can leave its mark.

Eight, my thoughts,

a red wine chorus that only knows the call of the wild,

throaty and foreign

to a land that is all tongues of moss,

looking for a break in whispers of heavy oak.

Seven: my fingers,

a riot of nightsticks that speak in the burnt down bruise

of a national anthem

after the city has kissed the bomb. 

Six: My touch,

the lavender bloom of heartbeats,

before the shrapnel found it home,

before the enemy battlefield night  

where no waited for sunset.

Five: my feet,

that walked on cinderblock and missing staircase,

forgetting the scrapes gaps can hold in a toss of blue Octobers

until every birthday became a spin cycle.

Counting down.

Counting down.

Four: eyelashes, drunk with the hide and go seek bat

of this quest for saltwater secrets.

Three, my hair, fastened and forgotten, threatening to break

Break like an anchor without an ocean floor.

Break like a sugar-paned window no one could taste.

Break like a mute who holds fear under their tongue,

because the familiar,

is better than the abandoned.

Two: my skin,

with its quilt work of story, hungry for inkwells, without the punch of stain.

One, my face, sometimes I try to Picasso the pieces,

stare hard in the mirror, when I’m counting down.

I check my labels for special care instructions,

I was not placed on this earth to shrink.

So first, I spend Monday through Friday trying to save the world,

which only leaves the weekend to save myself.

Second, I will recognize trust as a shipwrecked boat with a savage crew,

and search for the captain until my flashlight burns out.

Third. I will remind fear I am no vegetation,

I will not be out-muscled on this food chain.

Four. I remember countdowns lead to many things

like blastoffs or risking it all.

Fifth. Half way to anywhere is a step in the right direction.

Sixth. Because ghosts of dictionaries live in my cabinets, hungry and haunting.

Seventh. One day the wishes will be born, and no one will ask

why I wasted all that time looking for license plates patterns or staring at clocks.

Eighth. Because I learned to laugh the same time I learned to cry,

and pay worship to the nature of them both.

Ninth. We all know what the nine circles of hell  hold,

I will whittle my self into right angles

to trap this spin cycle the next time it arrives.

Tenth. I am criminal of spreading myself too thin.

Because I have inherited of the curse of falling in love with everyone and everything.

Because I have learned.

Learned to add with my own words,

Learned I will build with these numbers

instead of allowing the world subtract

all the pieces,

it wants from me.