WHERE I’VE BEEN

eleanor johnston-carter
 this is not a narrative exactly
more photograph captured in hindsight, framework created from reclaimed wreckage
all poetry is fiction. everything in this book is true.
this is not for you to understand

afterglow
here in blue light
waiting on Mill

tinitus
flock of silhouettes
distortion of perfect surface

dust
clothes draped on the chair
punctuated quiet
speaking into the empty room

you know how it feels to disappear

the last four autumns with you like an empty shell far from the ocean
holding you to my ear waiting to hear anything at all
retreating inside our shared body
two hearts scooped out like ice cream in the bowl with my name in cursive
the one you broke a long time ago
i am losing everything except for myself i am losing you too
we are entirely alone
we are lying next to each other on the twin bed
one body looped around itself
my hand in the hollow of your collar bone or your hand in the hollow of mine
the same hand
the same emptiness to be filled
portrait of january

lying on my back on the industrial carpet in my freshman dorm room drunk on

peppermint schnapps and cheap beer the green cans swimming like iridescent
fish in my vision the crack of light through the blinds the whir of the heater the
world spinning while i stand still or my body spinning while the world does

asleep under three blankets my phone ringing my eyes unfocused the whole
world gone soft wishing this was a dream wishing i could force myself awake

tripping spinning flashing pulsing standing at the bus stop early the next morning
shaking from the come down

my spine pressing against the wooden chair the florescent light turning everyone
blurry and yellow listening to the story about someone choking on their own vomit
curling into myself watching the world through a thick layer of glass or fog

holing up inside the blank parts of my mind with the nausea and the trembling
and the foreign invader that i keep feeding even when i forget to feed myself

somewhere outside of my body trying and failing to stand up giving in to the

gentle pressure of her hands in my hair staring at the picture of us on my phone

apologizing for everything telling myself to be quiet walking home somehow

falling asleep for several uninterrupted hours

sick like throwing up sick like i can’t stop doing this sick like always ending up
back here
perfect point of safety

bound to disappearance like a blood relative, like gravity

unstuck from the family tree, from the orbit around the sun,
i am separate from all that
like reflection, the throwing back by a body without absorbing

and how do i become that body?

how do i turn this into mirrored surfaces?

vision goes kaleidoscopic, i see and think and feel at the base level
things shift back
like childhood

do you remember the feeling of safety?

of being held by light?

the you is me, these are questions spoken into an empty room
streetlights illuminating empty sidewalks
no footsteps entering or retreating

i exist in lightless hallways

the holy spaces that formed me like waves form sand from stones
the stucco beneath my fingertips doesn’t tell the whole story,
doesn’t paint a picture with enough details to mean anything

the eyes watch me, marbles in a glass jar, rocks in dry creek beds
i see all this but it doesn’t see me
my reflection doesn’t recognize itself in the dark

i record the moment, the burst of light and the lasting impact,
the sting of tired eyes
the connections to mornings i don’t want to name
they aren’t connected to this, they exist outside, in that other place
homeostasis

curtains closed light comes through

sun yellow on hardwood
striped against desk

football tennisball
hands throwing catching
gentle touch of hit ceiling

clothes scattered on floor

jeans sweatshirts t-shirts
tossed aside wrinkles growing

dried flowers dresser vase

yellow bright green dull
flat blue

sheets dirty crumpled

legs tangled bare
your touch mine

door opens
you come in

light and smoke

gasp of breath
return to quiet

shoe makes contact

ladybug dead on floor
honey in mouth on hands

watching you fluid motion all limbs

sweat on skin in mouth
pores open eyes too

all things together

circular beginning and end
same moment in time

heartbeat slow contact of skin

warmth against warmth
i become home
green line

one of us is always leaving

the ring of the bell through the early morning air
fingertips brush against each other as we pull apart

you hold blood in your hands

the same hands that hold my body
you are fixed in place

somewhere i am always alone

at the end of the day or at the beginning
it doesn’t matter it’s not the point

i am listening to strangers speak

we are locked in this routine
when the sun comes out again i’ll show you what i mean

this is how i’ll remember it

the stillness

the wind the day i was born

a memory not mine to remember but remembered somehow
shared somehow
like blood running through two bodies at the same time

the sky clouded over like a dome

like i could pick the whole thing up
and turn it upside down

alone of course
permanent as a member of my own family
more permanent maybe
more permanent in most ways that matter

who i used to be and who i am now

the differences only perceptible when i see my reflection in windows
when i’m caught off guard

the light in the kitchen

left on all night for my whole life
waiting for someone to come home from wherever they went
waiting for me to come home from wherever i went
parallel

i reached inside your mouth

urge to feel impossible smoothness of bone
warm water fills cupped hands
i disappear into this
the sound of the chainsaw
the sudden lack, the absence
your fingers still tracing their endless circles
stockholm syndrome

i see my own ghost and the balloons in the car and the pigeons on the wire and
the blue of the sky and i remember returning and i remember never being gone

communion

in darkness,
the door opens both ways
the static forms the outline of the body
pressing hand to skin
searching for spot where heartbeat does not push through

this is a remembrance of me
covered in bruises you cannot see

how long i stood in that dark place how long i sat on the rocks before anyone
else was awake dreaming of finding the edge not to jump just to be there just to
see what’s waiting below.

the water splashing the shore a warning every gut feeling i’ve ignored and every
street i’ve jaywalked across since moving here.

it feels early still a smooth stone pressed into my pocket cold against burnt
fingertips twin canadian geese crossing the sky one behind the other

arms wrapped around knees collar and wrist bones visible the layers of my vision
onion skin or transparencies

“i’m stuck” written in green marker on a streetlight on broadway “i’m here” written
in ink pen on the rock that sort of permanent or that sort of desperate

stumbling over the earth pressing my palm against the trunk of the tree the cold
warm feeling as the streetlights click on

wanting to go but not wanting to get there dead end streets and cul-de-sacs
things turning around
acid

i feel the love in the holding

in the body against body
the shifting of the light the edges of warmth connecting and distorting
the feeling in the air like ice cubes clinking together in a glass

the not quite darkness no curtains on the window

orion’s belt the big dipper the milky way all that safety out there
all the safety right here

slowing down
dissecting the connection the desperation with which i want
and the desperation with which i do

the sky turns towards blue

towards morning
i accept the blessing of this one especially

i keep speaking
fleshing out the specific point of safety
practice opening my heart enough to hear it
trying is something trying is almost enough

i don’t care where honesty comes from only that it’s here
that you are and that i am
the three of us in bed together the pale shine of moonlight on my face
i don’t care what created this moment only that it was created

the pigeon dying on the sidewalk

the cigarettes the desperate reaching for them
i pray for all this i hear the response
the voice in my head not a voice but a presence a warm light
everything will be okay all living things will be safe from harm

it’s where i go with you or get close to

staring at the patch of light on the ceiling
i can see my body from above an ambulance or an operating room
i am cut open i am pulled back into the moment
into the closeness with you
the instability of blood

my own eyes staring back at me

made small by thick lenses and faint glint of tears
all of this familiar by now

the background distorts

empty space between edge of face and edge of glass
i exist there
the whole afternoon does

the secret being kept

and my inability to break the truce
both what i am afraid of and afraid for

the soundtrack shifts

you can close your eyes, it’s all right
sung in whispered voice of child
the roles now reversed

he drives without hands on the wheel

we move in a straight line
everything held in old precarious balance
shell of father

across woven wire table sits holy ghost

eyes so far back they are invisible glistening with tears
are you sad?
i am not ready to touch this the wound is not yet cauterized
i wish i could make meaning from this he is eight years old walking across
virginia asphalt when he meets it
i don’t know how old i am i am crying into the pillow i am discovering the hole in
the wall
he begins to resemble ghost the lost look to him i am unable to focus
the old line cuts in mid scene
we’re both gonna leave
i am no longer sure who is going first
who invented bravery

i see you in orange light knife plunged into back allowed to remain rust colored
memory i see you in darkness white light through familiar doorway glass
propping kitchen window open i wait for you even now i saw the future cradled it
like part of me imagined in frenzied days of hands on stomach searching for
phantom limb or heartbeat what if visions were reality growing heavy curved
spine held by curved spine where would we stand now the triangle of grief the
future too far to plan for too close to close eyes to half formed hands enclosed in
yours comfort held in tenderness by destroyer cracked whole held momentarily
by hands dropping glass against creaking hardwood
the eight months away

moths on counters and walls

sleeping bodies or corpses
i created you from shapes in the darkness
looking back before the beginning
you are still there
but with details removed
residual brightness after staring at the sun
graveyards

i. all that nervous energy and no time to think

coffee donuts cold water
awake for too many hours to count
falling asleep in daylight

the specific summer quality to the air

body curled under the blanket
the world like a greenhouse
finally capable of growth

broken glass on the sidewalk

coming home to love
pressed against you all day
lazily caught in dreamless sleep

unsure of where things hang

cold in summer eyes open in darkness
the shifted space smoking menthols at 3am
everything held in the air without being touched directly

the logistics of becoming unstuck

the sudden weightlessness
nothing strong enough to hold up to any real scrutiny
want replacing need

ii. the moment of black before the credits roll

time losing any meaning it once held
i ask the question without expecting an answer

heaviness carried with me

alcohol and humidity

love leaking out

light around the edges of the curtains
stuffing from seams worn thin

sick feeling outside at midnight

pulsing music shaking limbs
air still warm body slick with sweat

an anxious calm
held by everything
time space heat

sertraline

lacking shape or form

held forever without direct touch
never flesh always ghost
air and light and sound

cold side of the pillow

palm pressed hot against curved stomach
stray seconds where i’m anywhere
where it’s night again

safety in all this

even in cruelty
sickness sharp edge against skin
soft envelopment of familiar

picture her voice

never hearing it again
i can’t see it i brace for the day i can
for who i’ll be alone
pennoyer

things rise beyond control

caught in the loop: tired eyes that cushioned feeling separate from reality from
the world beyond the locked door
held still with the closed in air

bubblewrap around my brain

like my eyes should be turned inward
like all of me should be contained within my chest cavity
del rey

remembering the window

light and sound entering the room
shadow permanently fixed to this
winter gave way to spring and so on
it was autumn when we finally stood up to leave
a random string of events is hard to understand as a story

i. rolling over at 4am, the lights on, glowing red. other nights with lights left on,
the connections i can’t quite fit together in my head. all the same, maybe one
unlike the rest.
ii. the air at night and in the morning, cold and cloud cover. still awake when it
becomes tomorrow, walking home at midnight.
iii. all the dreams i don’t remember and the ones i do: the ones where i talk to
you and everything is okay again. or not again, where everything is okay for
the first time.
iv. i forgot to leave a space, or i left it so long i forgot it wasn’t meant to be empty.
i want until i stop wanting, until i forget what i was even waiting for.
v. the lies i told and continue to tell, things dimly lit by whatever forces its way
through the clouds.
vi. the notifications on my phone, the train going by outside, the water rushing
through the wall.
thankfulness

orange haze prison light smoke stacks radio antenna blinking red rain soaked
vision bubble just before burst arizona snow globe brown paper bag hand
transfers to hand grips steering wheel peaches everclear green glass false family
this becomes memory
something about

the fruit straining against the bag

the push of skin against plastic
the quiet fear of breaking

the light reflecting in the line of cars

the wince of brightness when white meets eye

the spiraling upward of the road

the slowness of travel amongst obstacles

the wind and the street and the train

the desperate quiet of the ringing

the familiar made unknown

the loss of time away
the end of one thing is the beginning of something else

we stare out across the wide expanse of desert. the quiet hold of amber light and
its associated heat lulls me into some sort of trance, like the one i felt on the
train, like i’m somehow separate from all of it, looking out from inside a
greenhouse. we were held captive by this idea for so long: disappearing down
highways lit only by headlights, driving away from lives we’d let slip idly by. we
once shared the same memory, the one from childhood, i’m not sure if any of that
matters now.