Bluejay

a wound-shaped woman lies on the floor and her children jump onher belly and her four husbands pound and stomp and brush theirtoes against her skin and her children are children of deceit and sheis still on the floor listening to a playlist called “Mitski ranked inorder of sadness” she can feel her intestines pulsating but hersadness is unnamable magnanimous her first boyfriend challengesher to swallow seven pills dry and she coughs and chokes untilteardrops swim on her cheeks and then he chokes her at first it washot but soon it was a grip too brutal and she cries Please stop andhe keeps asking her if she remembers the safe word she doesn't sheblacks out soon after they never officially moved in there was noceremony one day she didn't take her dirty underwear home andstarted lining her skincare tubs next to his toiletries now they live indifferent continents he has zero wives he wanted to wife her up shewanted four husbands and counting he thought he was the one forher she is still on the floor the floor is on around beneath beyondher thousands and thousands of children are dead and her thirdhusband tweets ceasefire three days in a row her first husband anovelist says he saw a bluejay in his backyard it was the same onethat flew away with his boyfriend I'm sure he said he's my specialguy it was time for her to spend time with her newest husband theymet in the street markets of Paharganj she a hunter for lighters withobscene artworks discarded in airport security checks he a peddlerwho reeked like hooch always on the brink of burning they fueledthe lighters until they heard a hissing it was time to take him homethey rode on his motorcycle for over two days her mother wassleeping on the kitchen floor as still as the marble underneath theirfront door open when she saw her daughter's newest conquest shesaid remember when you were little we didn't have a car so yourdad rode his motorcycle everywhere except when it rained you hadto miss school the yellow umbrella flew away in the wind so wepostponed moving to a better apartment we bought a second-handwhite Maruti 800 it got stolen some months later by a drunk boywho left plastic bags of his shit in the trunk anyway I have beenthinking about your father lately I wonder who he's fucking thesedays you take after him I hope you can take a joke silly girl and hernewest husband says I need some air and the wound-shaped womansits on the floor next to her mother and scooches until every part ofher body is cold from the marble and there are no children nohusbands only bluejays