Jennifer Fossenbell recently relocated from Beijing, China back to Denver, USA. Her poetry and other linguistic experiments have appeared in online and print publications in China, the U.S., and Vietnam, most recently So & So, Black Warrior Review, The Hunger, and where is the river. She completed her creative writing MFA at the University of Minnesota in 2014. Also, there is no “back”.
WTF DID / YOU DO / TO MY OCEAN / (swoosh)
For all of these reasons and more: how far can a body stretch?
Across continents, across platforms, around entire other bodies
the alien self that grows and grows? How far can I listen to them
the many voices in the sub-sky spaces between the buildings
around the cars, floating over the streets? The weak signal
unstable connection, laggy device? How to respond large enough—
What’s in there, voices say. A watermelon, a bowling ball?
A soccer ball. Hahahahaha. A body floats in the dark
and I keep thinking he must be scared and lonely. A body drowned
but living, unoriented in his disoriented world. Not waiting
but living while his world waits for him. It doesn’t drag its heels.
It wants to keep him inside forever. It wants to get him out right away.
Didi driver with a bee and flowers embroidered
on the right thigh of his jeans. Full color, gold thread. A lavish cameo
in my stomach-acid-bowling-ball day. He beats his arms
and legs with a firm fist while he drives. It’s a steady sound
and I guess it’s supposed to make him stronger and I guess
it makes me stronger too. I feel the strength of his bones in the way he turns
the wheel. He leans forward, I can’t see his face in the mirror. But he eyed
me when I got in. I saw the flash of horror on his face that people get. How
can a body stretch so far? The grotesquery is arresting. So alarmingly
surreal, I can’t blame anyone for looking twice to be sure they haven’t seen
a god.