Whoever turned
this dilapidated boat into a clinic did a bad job at soundproofing. “Hysteria…”
I overhear the doctor say, immediately understanding the sort of physician I’m
about to meet.
My brother is beaming
when he kneels in front of me in the waiting room. “Thank you for doing this, sister.
I know you’re tired of doctors, but he’s the best.”
I smile, but don’t
hide my disbelief—blood should never lie to blood.
“Hello, Ms. Márquez,”
the doctor says, closing his door behind me.”
“Márquez is my
first name,” I tell him.
“My apologies, I
thought—”
“Don’t worry,
doctor, you aren’t the first or last to assume my first is my last.”
Seeming not to
think my joke very funny, the doctor starts his interview. Ever broken a bone?
No. Experienced incontinence? Vivid dreams? Hallucinations? No. No. No.
After his precooked
list is done, the doctor says, “Ever felt like your body or thoughts are being
controlled by outside forces?”
I blink. “Am I insane?
Is that what you’re asking?”
“Well—” he
starts.
“No, doctor. My
sanity sleeps in imagination’s bed. They’re friends,” I say, winking.
“You do understand
that telling yourself tales won’t cure the pain?” he says. “There’re behavioral
changes that could help. I recommend avoiding red.” He points at my skirt, a favorite
talisman. “Red invites violent thoughts.”
I shake my head,
thinking, Poor little man. And laugh at his expression, when I say,
“I feed pain into my stories. For me, it’s active self-love in the time of
chaos.” He cringes at ‘self-love’, so I add, “I believe in the healing powers of
masturbation.”
The doctor’s
tone hardens. But his words can’t touch me. I’ve turned them into broken birds.
And I’m flying above all hurt, my red skirt storied into wings, the doctor’s
commands—hollow little bones—trying to bring me down and succeeding nevermore.
 |
photo by Svetlana Belyaeva
|
 |
the carcass of La Merced, by Magaly
Guerrero
|
The poem behind
the story:
Has
madness ever breathed down your neck?
You
know, when the pain twists your shoulder,
kicks
you in the hip,
rips at
your gut…
does it
make you fear you’re losing your sanity?
Flashing
my best Wednesday Addams smile, I say,
I keep
Sanity tied to the foot of Imagination’s bed…
She is
guarded by a crowd of realities
that
won’t stop telling each other,
“I’m
the only one!”
You do
understand, he says,
that
personifying the pain that cripples you
and
turning it into a fantasy
will
just increase the chaos;
you
won’t heal by fashioning stories
or by
creatively telling yourself you aren’t in pain.
I shake
my head, thinking,
You,
poor little man. So blinded. So limited.
Then I
laugh hysterically
at a
personal joke about Poe;
and
because I can’t help myself,
I look
into the doctor’s eyes, and hum,
“Nevermore,
nevermore, nevermore.”
