On the day I became single
It was raining.
each falling, opalescent raindrop was pregnant with a panoramic reflection of the bar where we sat.
and you said i never remember anything.
I recall how you asked me, there, on the porch of some uncrowded bar
how I felt. How I felt to be “single” on this January night.
Your words an injection of capsaicin
smoldering and dying in scarlet hewn plumes of smoke.
Seducing the ears of strangers.
why are you single
translated to
“you aren’t wiping someone else’s come off your neck? you must be miserable”
I pictured girls in stylish earth tone lingerie
soft angles in chiaroscuro
Women fluent in IKEA
Couples probably on their way home to snort lines of pumpkin spice off of their upcycled coffee table.
Couples on their way home
To ignore one anothers imperfections for the sake of company.
To spew absinthe induced I love yous like premature ejaculate.
As if I could ever long to go home and whisper my netflix account password into his ear. His oratory surfaces acknowledging the capital letters and required numbers.
We could share a clove cigarette. agree. exhale.
live life in the earlybird or valencia instagram filter.
You asked
if I “minded” being “single”.
Implying that at some point I must have been ‘double’. That I could have even been ‘triple’ and maybe narrowly escaped being ‘half’.
You made me to be a shot of espresso. A double breve when you have to study for mid terms. Single when you haven’t a reason to still be awake.
You made me to be a gilded, amber shot of whiskey. Doubled at your ex lovers going away party. single when, left alone, you still struggle to forget her.
You made me to be the dimensions of a trailer. Single if its mobile. Double when it’s spent its years in some dandelion freckled trailer park.
I am the occupancy of a cheap motel room. Double on your coming of age road trip,
single when you missed the last flight out of albequerque and refuse to sleep in another air port chair.
I am a scoop of coconut ice cream. single on the first date. double when you work up the courage to pee with door open.
and at that moment everyone was looking at me.
At me because I was now “single”. For the first time in my life.
I imagined my sloven liberation from the womb.
Imagined that the doctor on-call
might have declared “its a single!”
my mother freely shed tears–a briney mixture of joy and abandonment.
And my dad pushed the damp hair from her temples and whispered
“I’ve always wanted a single”
So, naturally, when you asked me this, I was disappointed.
Imagine winter nights
your body baptized in the thick, opaque Appalachian fog.
Your eyes married to some waning view of a silhouetted tree or a homebound rabbit disappearing into blind night.
now imagine not feeling alone at all.
imagine lovers with whom you have shared a cup of coffee. With whom you have cared for a cat. With whom you have occupied a tent. With whom you have rationed a last dollar.
don’t feel “single”… or “double” for that matter.
feel how you felt.
Before the blue orchids and the movies.
Before the drinks in the park after work.
Before the sushi and the soy candles and the brunch and the breakup.
Is it normal yet?
To quantify yourself in this manner.
To think that you might grow exponentially by simply colliding souls with another being. To assume that every union deserves a tiny ‘2’ floating in the upper right corner.
Announcing “ I am double”. I am more than one.
I am in a relationship–therefore I am more.
So remember when I left the bar suddenly, unexpectedly that night, my left arm through my coat-sleeve, my right waving goodbye, It was not because I was afraid.
I do not fear the way the night forces elongated shadows into the hollow cityscape.
I left because I was single. Because I belonged to nobody. Because I could be there at the bar with you as well as anywhere, and the difference was as slight as the change from silt to mud.
In that moment
I felt completely and overwhelmingly connected.
AUTHOR: Indy Srinath
EMAIL: [email protected]
AUTHOR BIO: Indy Srinath is a homesteader and writer from Western North Carolina. When her hands aren’t covered in soil, she performs spoken word poetry and teaches elementary school students about environmental stewardship.
LINK TO SOCIAL MEDIA: https://www.facebook.com/indy.srinath
