Evyan Roberts
|
Evyan Roberts (she/her) is a queer, fat, black, femme who is deeply committed to intersectional feminism and #blackgirlmagic. She holds a BA in English, with a concentration in Creative Writing, from Wells College and was a recipient of The M. Helena Zachs Prize in Fiction. Her writing has appeared in Ithaca Lit, Not Your Mother's Breast Milk, Rogue Agent and elsewhere. She lives in Maryland and is currently pursuing a Masters in Social Work.
IG: @writing.femme blog: killjoyfemme.wordpress.com |
As I Open Close
at your solar command
open and close
lay open, to watch the nectar dry
muscles, hushed, we carry you
from your grin
i wilt, as you whirligig days
these painful revolutions of nerves
beneath husked skin, like burning earth
holding your hurt, our fingers
weave together, cradling pain
two minds press gently forward
speaking to the quavering future
washed with smiles, as you’re washed
with your tears
behind your drowned dutch blue iris
reveal how your hurt, hurts my matter too
splitting my folds open, close
at your solar command.
open and close
lay open, to watch the nectar dry
muscles, hushed, we carry you
from your grin
i wilt, as you whirligig days
these painful revolutions of nerves
beneath husked skin, like burning earth
holding your hurt, our fingers
weave together, cradling pain
two minds press gently forward
speaking to the quavering future
washed with smiles, as you’re washed
with your tears
behind your drowned dutch blue iris
reveal how your hurt, hurts my matter too
splitting my folds open, close
at your solar command.
Commentary
Evyan on "As I Open Close":
I often grapple with my diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis. It's been three years since, and I'm still learning about my relationship with chronic pain. I question how others can do this and how others who hurt more severely survive their own skin.
Creating this poem, I was writing in this familiar space of tender anger. Irate because of all the things the physical pain can do to my body and the bodies of the ones I love. But charged with sentimentality; I cannot love someone out of that pain and no one can love me enough to alleviate my own, either.
Living in constant states of physical pain can muddle your emotions, manifesting into a transference; you and your beloveds are sharing pain in love. Which left me contemplating who are we when the physical becomes emotional and it overrides our most tender feelings between one another? What are our connections when we try to pretend we don’t hurt?
EIC Christine Taylor on "As I Open Close":
After Evyan's poem came over the transom, I read it several times, and each time I came away with a different interpretation. First, I thought of lovers trying to reconcile a hurt between them. Then I thought of one trying to navigate an oppressive society. Then I wondered if the poem were about one's own inner conflict with the mind and body. At that point, it occurred to me that this poem is special for the very reason that it does so much for the reader—almost like it meets the reader on their own journey, takes their hand, and says, "Yes, please come." And I suppose looking back that each time I read the poem, I was indeed struggling with some painful tension in my own life that Evyan's poem seemed to speak to directly. I was definitely eager to read her commentary so that I could figure out "what the poem was about," but ultimately, "As I Open Close" has a life that encompasses so much more than the space on the page.
I often grapple with my diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis. It's been three years since, and I'm still learning about my relationship with chronic pain. I question how others can do this and how others who hurt more severely survive their own skin.
Creating this poem, I was writing in this familiar space of tender anger. Irate because of all the things the physical pain can do to my body and the bodies of the ones I love. But charged with sentimentality; I cannot love someone out of that pain and no one can love me enough to alleviate my own, either.
Living in constant states of physical pain can muddle your emotions, manifesting into a transference; you and your beloveds are sharing pain in love. Which left me contemplating who are we when the physical becomes emotional and it overrides our most tender feelings between one another? What are our connections when we try to pretend we don’t hurt?
EIC Christine Taylor on "As I Open Close":
After Evyan's poem came over the transom, I read it several times, and each time I came away with a different interpretation. First, I thought of lovers trying to reconcile a hurt between them. Then I thought of one trying to navigate an oppressive society. Then I wondered if the poem were about one's own inner conflict with the mind and body. At that point, it occurred to me that this poem is special for the very reason that it does so much for the reader—almost like it meets the reader on their own journey, takes their hand, and says, "Yes, please come." And I suppose looking back that each time I read the poem, I was indeed struggling with some painful tension in my own life that Evyan's poem seemed to speak to directly. I was definitely eager to read her commentary so that I could figure out "what the poem was about," but ultimately, "As I Open Close" has a life that encompasses so much more than the space on the page.
