I hear it. An effigy: constructed of lies meticulously placed by shaking hands. We share a face. We share a body. A long time ago, it came to life, taking my place, speaking its words as my truth. It’s okay. I watch it from the safety of a dark place where no one can reach me. No one can reach me. 

*

Sister and Mama watch television in the living room. I join them without a word.

We are watching a show where a boy lives in a barrel except the boy is not a boy. None of the children in the show are children: they are adults dressed in children’s clothing. The show is funny, so sister and Mama laugh often, but I don’t always hear the joke, so I only laugh sometimes.

I withdraw, again, without a word.

That night I dream of a barrel. Outside the barrel, the air is hostile with the sounds of screeching metal. I crawl inside it, inside where it is quiet. The quiet is accompanied by darkness. Inside the quiet darkness, I lose sense of my body’s boundaries, of my outline; I can’t tell if my eyes are open. I assume they are open.

Soon, the space inside the barrel constricts. Tighter and tighter and tighter and tighter. As the tightening space reaches my skin, I remember the boundaries, now being crushed inside the empty barrel. I am being squeezed down into nothingness. Soon, I begin to ooze through the cracks in the barrel. Misshapen, formless life, splintered and cramped. 

My reflection in the waiting room mirror. Large body, so fragile. He is a specter, moving through the world beyond the glass. He watches me, I am the specter. I’m sure of it. 

*

I remember when Papa was here. It is my tenth birthday.

A big party for a special boy, he says.

I run, I play. Today is mine. I fall and scrape my knee but I don’t cry. Today is mine. In the bathroom, Mama cleans the blood and dirt from my knee. Once the bandage is on, out I run. I run too fast, or maybe not fast enough, and I am face-to-face with it. A slaughtered pig. Its legs are tied together, it cannot run. Papa asks if I am hungry. It is almost ready. But I don’t hear him. I don’t hear him over the squeals of a burning pig. 

Interrogation:

How old are you,

Do you drink or smoke,

Have you been exposed to any loud noises in the last three months.

Invasion:

Take off your clothes, put on this gown,

Step on the scale,

Open your mouth,

Tilt your head.

He probes with his light. I don’t speak, just stare at the walls decorated by illustrations of dissected human bodies. He probes. Mama joins us, at His request. He describes my ears. I don’t listen. I no longer want to listen. 

*

I’ve lost myself among the rows of trees who use the wind to lean into one another and whisper dark secrets only they can understand. I am under the threat of hearing something forbidden. Secrets of the forest. Unseen fruit, steeped in poison. Hostile messages shared above me, in a canopy too distant to ever reach.

I will never reach it. One foot after another. Retracing my steps. The path leads me in circles, I never began so I can never end. The trees hold council, decide my fate.

I refuse to listen. But soon I hear the singing. Celebratory cantos: millions of insect spirits singing a chorus of orgiastic revelry. The whispers of the tree are buried in their songs. I listen. I hear them. 

*

Naked. My body sheds its skin. Painfully, I peel it, leave it in one piece. I am new again. New boundaries, protected by high-pitched ringing. Newborn body, free of blemish; born again in song. I escape the instant. I escape the I. Only I can hear it; only I can reach it.