the summer i died halfway

Sophie Mo

the first time i realized there was something unheimlich
in the way i was still, ultimately, irrevocably, alive
breathing, heart pounding, hummingbirds in my throat alive
was in class when i talked to a girl who unscrewed my limbs
one by one like some mannequin and convinced me in a voice
that dripped with molasses and jagged crystals that i had
put on my head backward and to fix it i would need to take that leap
out of the second-story window into the maw of the pool underneath
and then maybe, just maybe, i will feel contentment on the pad
of my tongue tasting like the song of heat waves in sweltering summer

but would it work? i asked and she laughed at me delightfully,
a hand over her heart as if she wanted to pull it out from the
confines of her ribcage and offer it to me as one would for a deity

imagine, she sang to me at the edge of the fall
just a breath’s width away,

imagine what?

the wind in your hair, the surfeit of bubbles in your mouth,
the taste of chloride burning down your throat,
and then you will believe

but i do not want to believe—

you must.
she turned to me with eyes that held the epiphany
philosophers could only dream of reaching
would you doubt yourself?