Body Narrative

October 8 2024
I’ve spent a lot of energy recently thinking about the tightness in my jaw. The first thing I do when I get out of bed in the morning is peel the mouthguard out of my teeth to soak in its cleaning liquid until it repeats the process. I will eventually grind my way through this plastic layer too –– just like its predecessor –– destined to a life of slowly being ground down to a state and unable to perform its function. I cannot sleep without this barrier. My jaw grinds itself to the nerves. I don’t know how to use my jaw without overusing it.
(I don’t have anything interesting to say, but I am hungry to sweat).
My muscles have never felt so tight. As every day passes, I slowly become more tense, spending more time sitting at my computer and less time in a dance studio or a pool or on a trail. The less my body moves, the further and further I fall away from her, as if my skin is a shell hardened to carry out tasks and the softest version of myself continues to shrink deep within it. I teach and talk about the cracks between the movements we have been trained to show – the transitional folds in our elbows like pockets of possibilities – but I think alliteration is cliché today. The literary critic does not rest, but takes a firm hold on production. The creases in my hips are not as pliable as they once were. And thus, I suppose, is the inevitable dance with mortality.
I spend a lot of energy thinking about how my jaw is tight. My jaw is always tight. I am cold so often. What is it in my life that stops my blood from flowing?



A Plywood Ribcage
Time to sink in my mind is not a waste,
Nor is time to sink in my body
In the floor
In gravity
For my bones to feel themselves
Feel their relationship to this earth
In their heaviness.
I revel in the feelings of my hands on the floor
–– that pinky ridge reach from
marley to mirror
Beside my cheek
My eyes are also here
in their heaviness.
The widest infinite hug
with these boards
This board to breast embrace
Surrendering this flesh and muscle matter
Breathing.
Breathing through my ribs
Into the sky
And down to the roots of these wooden planks
Pressed for the purpose of
a roll that no one will see.
Imagine the purpose of a breath
of gravity,
nothing more,
And allowing it.

Duties are organized by chunks of time – the school day is made up of “blocks” that tell us where we should be and when and for how long and what should be accomplished there and then. And then there are the spaces between the blocks. I have a few minutes between my photocopies and my first class. There are scraps of minutes between dinnertime clean up and commencing the bedtime routine. The snooze snuggle that happens in those eight minutes before the second chime is an essential part of waking up. Among the map of time are creases left for tasteful indulgence, moments to be inspired, and moments to dance. Stretch these creases –– like those in my elbows and hips –– and I know I’m exercising my time, my life, and my body.

70|37.5
What is a good use of my time?
What could I catch if I
(felt I had the time to)
stand in the water
Waiting
Waiting to see what passes by fearlessly?
Distracted mind,
why waste your energy on
“Why”
instead of asking
“What next?”
or considering
“What’s here?”
and tending to it?