I work at a smoothie place but
I have dyspraxia
Or something like it. It makes me do things
Slow. Your eyes blend shit together
By default -- the sky's only blue
Cuz you mixed up the spectra. They didn't teach you that, did they? There's some purple
Up there.
My body sees the whole world
Sorta like that. I've got color
And sound and light like a blur blooming
Into a flower of memory so I can't say
Exactly what happened but --
But I stop to smell the roses like my life
Depends on it. Ergo I can't find
The cabbage in the walk-in fridge I can't
Scoop the ice cream or dunk the fries or
Chop the celery.
I am sleepwalking down
A botanical garden of blenders. It's cognitive
Dissonance. You've got cities in your head
To match the microwave settings. I break
Another cup. God, the same something
That's wrong with me is gonna
Save my life. From the clouds, even shit like this
Looks gorgeous.
Seventh hour on the clock
I cut a finger with the fruits. Dark globules down
A rivulet of citrus, stream cradling
The drops like an amniotic sac, cool smoke
Peeling off the blender ice.
I don't let people love me back
In this economy. You can't have anything
That'll kill you to lose. Every time I kiss you
I subscribe to the multiverse
And enter the timeline where I didn't.
But an hour after sixth, my knife slipped
And I fell in love with you
Again and again and again and again. Bleached
The blood floor after dark, shoe gnarled
In the mop of a Cyprus root.
How many years did I give
To the stars? In the cosmic rupture
Of the final hour
I forgot how to get back home. Just stood
By the stadium lights. Around this time,
I was born.
Devaki Devay
Devaki Devay is a community college transfer, former ice cream scooper, and college journalist studying rhetoric at UC Berkeley. Their writing generally centers around trauma, disability & the South Asian diaspora, and can be found in The Roadrunner Review, Okay Donkey Mag, and Entropy Mag.