Layer by layer, I peel it all off
slow and sticky, until I’m standing alone
in a pool of what once clothed me
I look down and wonder to myself
How can anything be left?
I close my eyes
and I’m being held
by a body of water
neither warm nor cold
neither sinking nor floating
not above not below
and the gentle water
envelopes my face
softly kissing my cheeks
Notes:
Limbo. (noun)
“A place for unbaptized souls
that are barred from heaven
through no fault of their own.”
02
Days later I am walking home
from work in the rain
tightly bound in my layers and
hidden from the harsh wind.
A weighty gust blows off my hood
and I stop to look up at the cloudy sky
I’m lost so I close my eyes
and wait until I feel the soft
water kiss my skin
Notes:
Liminality. (noun)
“Often studied by Anthropologists,
It is a stage of life where an individual
is not what they once were
but also not yet what they will be.”
Derived from the Latin word līmen
meaning a threshold.
03
Imagine this,
you’re five years old
the kitchen table is old and made of wood
you’re coloring on a blank sheet of paper and
you pick up your crayon and examine your scribbles
a smile stretches across your face
you believe this to be a work of art
Fast-forward and you’re thirty-something now
your mom no longer hangs your art up on the fridge
this makes sense to you because you no longer
believe it to be a work of art either
Where did I go?