1655c

i spend hours trying to take a flash photograph of the interior of my ears

because they are Different Now

it looks how i expect it to except

there is a singular Orange dot;

it doesn’t hurt but

i imagine there are delicate, impenetrable bubbles

around each of my ears

they are dense and

only certain things can pass through them

we are sitting in a circle

we are talking, and

they are laughing and so now I am laughing too!

music is playing and they are listening to it

and I am listening to a different version of the same song

and I try to imagine the version of my body that listened to it like they do, so

i take my shoes off and place my feet on the ground

to feel the vibrations

and how they travel up my legs

i practice listening this way

i get in my car and drive

but I don’t have a car I take the subway

and I can only sit in the Orange chairs that match my

Orange clothes

i run into the bathroom.

the walls are yellow

they breathe so I don’t have to

everything’s diagonal

that song is playing and I won’t listen to it anymore

we leave and my mom buys me scones and

i cry harder than I ever have on the train and after that I don’t cry for months

i miss the feeling of water against my skin

the way it touches every part of me all at once

but it’s like I’m not being touched at all

like there’s nothing to even touch

like it’s seeing parts of me that aren’t here yet …

the last time I swam

i got out of the water and I was covered in seaweed

it was red and my top was

Orange

I feel alone!

I feel you,

feeling alone.

when i close my eyes i see

Orange

i see

Me, and i’m

taking off my sweatshirt and my undershirt rides up too far

and i touch it with my fingers and

it is

the ringing in my ears

is Orange

and the gulf between me and the sound is

Orange and so

i don’t mind

the Ringing

i stay up all night just to listen to it

just like when I was little and

i would go to bed before the sun went down

and listen to the squeaking in my ears and

pretend they were small firemen

who lived just behind my ear drum

i would plug my ears to see if they were still there sometimes

i do that now too

why do i only exist when my eyes are closed?

the space just behind my eyelids is

the most beautiful shade

of

Orange.