a pinch from god
on how she left me dripping wet.
Last year, I survived my first lesbian breakup by running away from my Hawai’i hometown to spend the summer in the Northwest. After my ex and I reconciled, she left me again. This time, two days after my grandfather died. One thing I forced myself to do every day, up until his death and our split, was write in a journal. It kept me alive. The following is adapted from this survival journal. I call this series “Letters from Paradise: Excerpts From a Dyke Diary”. Each entry was written before her great betrayal— when she still tasted sweet, like Georgia peaches; shiny, like chrome Tahitian pearls.
Dear Pearl,
God left me at nineteen. The first and last time I faced his halo, I stood dripping wet in a Williamsburg apartment surrounded by corpses and medical specimens. The jars sparkled, earthquaking together like a spell. Williamsburg is a strange, buzzing, place. The men, stranger. Buzzier.
“Do you still believe in Jesus, then?” my ex boyfriend chuckled.
His question rings in my ear, today. When I met you, Pearl, you told me your Daddy was a preacher. He writes amazon novels about our man-of-the-hour, sewing sermons into your family group chats. He used to call you wrong. But, you could never be wrong. And, when I finally breathed you in, I felt all that religiosity return to me again. Some from your father, some from the petri dishes. Some from that teenage girl in me, preserved in formaldehyde.
For a moment, things were still. Certain. Like a law of physics arranged your face, your mannerisms, just to vex me. Whoever made you did so to rob me of my faculty. To make me stupid again. You have become my obstacle; the hiccup of your laugh, a rocket. The freckle in your eye, a pinch from God. Dancing across the ridges of your face felt like playing ʻWiped Outʻ for dykes. I’ve slipped and crashed into your water.
The sun is shining and her air drains all fluid from me, now, except for tears: Snot. Condensation. Sweat. Today, I am the same jester I always have been, praying at your invisible feet.
Here is a list of things I saw that reminded me of you. If you must know: