She told him to expand to his full breadth,
to breathe it all in, every square centi-
meter of aroma (pheromone and
exhale and perfume) until he burst in
a galaxy of desires as disord-
erly as jellyfish. He looked at her
as if she had told him to step on his
son’s head for it’d have made as much sense
to him. She’d wanted to avoid cliches
lousy with hollowed out echoes––”spread your
wings!” e.g.––pumped with starving arctic breeze,
booming empty as a barrel, but she
wants him fully prismatic, bulging at
the seams; he should be a bull elephant
terraforming the world––’now is time to
play; now is time to move; these trees have grown
into my path, and now I will mow them
down’ ––things elephants say. He should trumpet.
He should bathe himself in waters warm from
his snout. He should charge intruders into
the depths of the forest. There should be no
doubt that he is enormous. Send in her
spirit animal so she can be as free.
Let her swim. Let her fly. Let her tear through
the landscape with a madness only
she can know, anything but accept
fate like a bowl of tasty oranges
that delay her from appreciation
of wine, distractions, comforts. She becomes
eased, satisfied. Her teeth lose their edge.
Her nails become orderly. She learns to
play cards. Everything she does will have been (done).
This is a poem I wrote that was first published in a now defunct journal called The Birds We Piled Loosely, Issue 8, July 2016. I've edited the original punctuation because it was distracting with lots of forward slashes and many more em dashes.