from What Are You Afraid Of
///
events for
embellishing
a nightmare
my participation
in school
how long
it took me
to learn
evil is real
a game
a passing
vehicle
///
how long
it took me
to learn
evil is real
doubt has not been
without utility
even if
a kind of
chronic
distraction
occluding the obvious
so this behavior can be
explained
so what
///
brings to mind
some nocturne
your formative encounters
scraping dust from
a cliff
i was so disturbed
by their reaction
to “total” when we said
“in total solidarity”
///
what contingencies did they feel we failed
to account for? the tender
feelings of liberals
i must let it unfold bit
by bit like the rash
which began on my wrist
that i first noticed
in an organizing meeting
focused on advancing
the palestinian cultural
and academic boycott of israel
across our various affiliations
i was pregnant and allergic
to something, i don’t know
it was a mystery
by that evening the rash
reached all parts of my body
but remain concentrated
in my trunk and face
and stayed thus for weeks
in this state i was compelled
to attend a different meeting
a “community meeting”
convened under duress
people i considered
prior to these unfoldings
my friends were angry
because my co-workers
and i had not equivocated
in our condemnation
of israel’s genocide
in our demand for
palestinian freedom
were we excusing or
justifying violence
were we calling
for further violence
they suggested we
failed to understand
the complexity
that we left our community
behind because there was
not “consensus on the left”
that we were being political
when it was not our turn
when our focus was
supposed to be what?
poetry
i understood because
it was obvious what
they actually meant
that they felt we had exceeded
the permissible limit
by speaking of palestine
they felt threatened
and were offended
that their threatened feeling
was not our central concern
nauseated and burning
in a rectory basement i saw
their fear and i despised them
and still do
i am a weak person
i experience certainty only
in flashes so bright
an eclipse’s opposite
and only ever when i am regarding
hate or love
ferocious, deathless
what accumulates under
the snake’s rolling belly
awake, traveling rapidly
the world it portends
the world soon to be
impermissible or not
///
how i experience dread
how she experiences dread
an experience of communal dread
not knowing what is signalled
by that beeping
you are not understood
you are in the wrong place
you did not understand
///
what other animals fear
loneliness
cows, wild dogs,
whales, termites
unnecessary proof
not a name
many possible reactions
to the horizon’s drip
how dangerous i become
when i feel responsible
i have something to protect
when i become surroundings
is there a more appropriate goal
life goes on in some ways, your veins
change, in some ways the biggest
difference is that i can no longer
want to disappear
///
how a voice rots
placement
of blame
incremental
adjustments
papers on the surface of a desk
before the house explodes
///
my pastor’s sister gave
horseback riding lessons
at a stable not far from
our house
she did not attend our church
although, pale and dark haired,
she looked like her brother
whose name was chris
who lost his job because
he had an affair
our church folded
in shame
without achieving its
fundraising goal
to move out of
a middle school gym
like many girls i loved horses
for a short while my parents brought me
on saturdays to the stable for lessons
i rode in large circles
in a shadowy interior
the sun outside
a screen
after a few weeks she said
it was time to cantor
and this is when i learned
of a fear of speed
i was powerless and small
on a body
hardly beginning
to exert itself
circling and circling
the negotiation of control
is an illusion most
of the time
since you have nothing
of value to negotiate with
you make yourself dizzy
you barely hold on
we returned the following saturday
and as if banished by my dread
or repulsed by my cowardice
the sister whose name i forget
was not there
nor were the horses
the stable was empty
we returned to the car
as if that was that
///
once i thought to despise beauty
as a barrier to my freedom
rattling sounds
crackling sounds
possibly imagined sounds
behind the door
do you love it?
will you always?
now i am not sure
i return and dial
the number
the longing i feel like a gutter
i cautiously run beside
Laura Henriksen is the author of Duvall, Shelley (Newest York, 2025) and Laura’s Desires (Nightboat, 2024). Her writing can be found in LitHub, Little Mirror, SARKA, and other places. She lives in Bed-Stuy and teaches writing at Pratt Institute. She worked for a long time at the Poetry Project.
