I Feel Both Of Their Eyes On Me

(Does Mary Magdalene know what people say about her?)

The first time I saw color in two years, everything blossomed. I had a bleeding, honest heart and swore it was the renaissance of my life. Carter called me a whore for it- physically, spiritually; in writing and in flesh. I whored around in hotel rooms and fields and under stars and in poems and in empty tombs and the back of books and in between everyone and everything. I took all that I could. I was touch and go, I was movement, I was tears. All of my lovers, both imagined and real, could have had a chance at sweet talking their way back into my life if I was feeling weak. All but one. There wasn’t much to look back on except for my love of reconciliation that kept him on a leash. That was a problem of mine- I craved to understand, to make right so often and prematurely. I thought that the warmth of forgiveness would carry itself into all other areas.

It didn’t. The air surrounding us in early spring felt dead, and it did again the following Spring. Letters were followed by small talk which was followed by the expectations that were far greater than who I was. The landscape of the world we shared felt sullen no matter where we went. Winter in Manhattan, summer at the lake was all the same to me. Everywhere we went, I could feel his eyes on me. He held my age, my guilt in the palm of his hand while the other held me still.

I remember trying to carve meaning out of the world around me, but all that was there was my restlessness and my baby. Having him around made me feel like I was still stuck in that dreary day in the city. Cold and aimless. He sucked the life out of me just by sitting there and trying to love me, trying to get me to love him back. I’d inch away and he’d inch even closer. The brush of his leg against mine on the subway felt wrong, too much. I couldn’t stand it, and I couldn’t stand him.

A woman feels the weight of the world around her when she knows a man wants more than she can give. A sense of dread prevailed over the conversations we had.  He couldn’t hide it if he tried- he was my Judas by breath alone. I dug out his motive in every gesture, every pause, every glance. I didn’t want to know anymore about him. Like most men, he hated when I bloomed. He hated that I was capable of love and it didn’t go to him. He sold me out, gutted my memory to keep himself warm because my body was no longer there. I could be close enough to crave or in the cave with the angels and it wouldn’t ease that ache in his being. Nothing can.

(Did she feel ashamed to suffer?)

I’m grateful that he has a shoulder to cry on and another mouth to call me a whore. Forgiveness is warm and thick like a cut, running out slowly but surely. I feel both of their eyes on me often, wondering where I’m bleeding now.

(Can one person carry that much?)