Dear Sir:
My mouth has meanings
It had not wanted to argue.
—Jack Spicer
I can be okay with being an
awkward cliché. If the chicken
is the anxiety, then the egg is
the anxiety. Whether the chord
clashes from the beginning, some
where in the middle or waits until
the very end, it doesn’t matter. If
I were an expert, I’d say what mat
ters is that one develops a means
to vanquish it, to reduce it, at least.
Picture all the ways in my mind to
articulate (for me, in my head, which
is more of a scene, a diorama, a chart,
a photo with an image of me with a
magic wand in my hand, glitter swirling
around the tip of it) anxiety into non-
existence. The only thing is me, clean
from such degradation, floaty, eloquent
(with my mouth this time, not confined
within my thoughts). But those thoughts,
moving from inside to outside, as if in a
gorgeous setting, unpopulated, natural,
there has to be the sound of a burbling
brook, even if it is unseen, it might as
well be unseen. All of the jangled nerves
ease, all of the discomfort soothed as
mentally the diorama is moved from my
head to the stage that holds my presence,
that holds nothing but my eloquence, an
appropriate confidence, and then there’s
an audience, and I look into their eyes
and can know the clarity of what I’m
saying, what I’m presenting, of who
I am. The fluidity of freedom, the
euphoria of engagement, of being seen,
and the many directions each collaborator
takes what I have so happily and
freely given.
