Lizz Schumer - Biography of a Body

Biography

of a Body

Lizz Schumer

Copyright2021 LIZZ SCHUMER

All Rights Reserved

Published by Unsolicited Press

All rights reserved. Printed in the UnitedStates of America. No part of this book may be used or reproducedin any manner whatsoever without written permission except in thecase of brief quotations embodied in critical articles orreviews.

Unsolicited Press

Portland, Oregon

www.unsolicitedpress.com

orders@unsolicitedpress.com

619-354-8005

Cover Design: Kathryn Gerhardt

Editor: Kristen Marckmann

ISBN: 978-1-950730-70-4

For my family, who shows me whatlove

My body is a secret no one knows.

(Not even me.)

It reveals itself like a lover

And I wake beside it to sweet nothings in myears,

my joints,

my skin.

Electrical currents dance like champagnebubbles, and its New Years Eve 2001. Im wearing a black velvetdress with a forest of spangles and nude stockings, control-topbecause someone told me I was fat in kindergarten and Ill neverforget it. The velvet rubs against nylon, my hands rub against mysides, all of me rubs against all of me and the friction makes mereal. A disco ball flashes off my gold-rimmed glasses, the lipstickmy parents let me wear for the first time, as we all count down theminutes then hold our breath for the end of a world I didnt knowhadnt even begun yet. We greet our new millennium in silence, thefear of dawn in our eyes where the light cant touch it.

Ill find the snapshot years later and timewill jade me to my own insecurities. I wont see that my chest wastight with the anxiety of change that has followed me ever since wefilled the bathtub with water, stocked up on canned goods we sentto the food pantry in February, left flashlights by the door. Mynerves wound tight that night and thrum in my body even now. Theyquiver like tuning forks to the rhythm of a world that opened widewhen Y2K taught me my world was fragile and could end.

I will see gangly legs with too-roundknees,

a baby belly constricted by pantyhose Ididnt need.

A skirt, growth-spurt short.

No tits.

Wide eyes.

Velvet on dry skin snags.

A microscope might catch the pricklingneedles

Tiny snares for clothing, eyes.

I rend my own garments unconsciously

Arriving at work with runs in mystockings.

I am not one of the manicured girls

Who arrive coiffed and ready for the day.

My nails are jagged, like my skin is.

My hair statics in the wind.

No one meets my eyes.

(Not even me.)

Do you remember your own birthday?

As a child, I swore I did.

I had heard the story so often it felt likereliving it.

Mom on the way to Disney World.

A cramp, a tiny kick, and

I was on my way out

Three months early.

I think Ive spent the rest of my life tryingto recover those months of rejected sanctuary, the safety I thrustmyself out of before I knew what awaited me.

A little boy rides a red tricycle up and downthe street.

His wheels squeak through closed windows

The crash doesnt make the same sound.

Its shrill, in a different way.

And his blood is a different red too

But no less shiny on the sidewalk.

He didnt know his haste hadconsequences.

He had a mother to run home to, snot runningdown his face like blood from his knees when he learned sidewalksare hard and recklessness breeds pain, sometimes.

Adults break more often

But lack the solace children crave.

We need it too, I think.

I do.

My childhood is peppered with memories ofpain.

An ultrasound with cold, blue jelly.

The nurse said it wouldnt hurt,

That I needed a shot in my tummy,

The pain was like the opening sequence ofStar Wars.

I didnt cry.

I couldnt piss on command.

The man said to pee on the table.

Its ok.

Theres paper.

But I wasnt raised in a barn, so

I went to the bathroom instead.

I lay on the table afterward.

Freshly evacuated,

My legs spread wide, like he said.

Bared.

He thrust the catheter in

(A white-hot light spreading from my secretplace)

Didnt tell me what he was doing

Just stuck it in me like that.

I cried, that time.

Mom took me out to breakfast afterward anddidnt make me go to school. I remember pancakes and syrup from arinsed-out ketchup squirt bottle. A sticky Formica tabletop andswinging my legs beneath the bench. If she tried to explain whathad happened, I dont remember it. I do remember that I had the dayoff, although I wasnt sick.

Why? was not a question I knew enough toask.

Not yet.

The first time I had sex felt like that.

Push harder, I said.

I knew that pushing through pain is likebreaking down a wall. It takes persistence and force. His body wasa hammer, and I could feel my foundations cracking. Hairlines, atfirst. Then a splintering from my core, until I broke apart and redlight streamed through me, a sort of aural exhale.

I still didnt have the right questions andthere werent any pancakes afterward. Just wine in bed and pillowsthat cradled our aftermath, the bodies we inhabited a differentway. More light. I woke from a dream he died beside me. For onefrantic moment, I felt that mingling of terror and relief when wethink our worst, most secret fear came true.

Realized fears relieve me.

I dont have to be afraid anymore.

Anticipation as prison.

Living presents so many different ways to bewrong.

Debts are forgiven, like sins are.

A friend used to apologize for everythinganyone did.

Im sorry

she said, in answer to questions. In prefaceof them.

Im sorry to interrupt,

but

Sorry, could you?

Sorry, excuse me, I need something.

I am a person with needs.

We use words as extractions, pulling outcomeslike teeth.

A dog bared his, an invitation.

Air rushed through his jowls as he roaredwaterfall.

His eyes made better contact than my loversdo

when I ask him questions with words.

My teeth may garner better answers.

I panic a little, every time the telephonerings.

I like that word, the whole word. Tele soundslike progress.

It isnt, but things arent always what theyseem to be.

Perception, an individual art.

Our world is what we make it.

My parents house never changes, but my angledoes.

The same bed has cradled me sincechildhood

but my feet reach the end now.

Eyes closed, my brain knows every article inthat room.

It will forever, as familiar as my ownskin.

More so; my bedroom never ages.

The house smells the same

no matter how many candles my motherburns.

For years, we had a chocolate lab namedBacchus, Greek god of wine and revelry. He reigned over ourhousehold like humans never could, greeted us at the door eachevening, his otter tail thwacking our legs with forty lashes ofexcitement. His eyes were love drowning. But I disappointed him,each time. Hed lick my hand, nuzzle my crotch and slink away,waiting for his man. He wanted dad, his only master. The rest of uswere littermates, dad explained when we first got him.

Dogs need authority, like children do.

We stood alongside each other in the familyhierarchy,

except I got to pee indoors.

Bacchus died quickly, shortly after Christmasone year. We bought the wrong dog food, fed it to him three times.The stores were closed for holidays. A mold grew on the food, theFDA officials told us. A failure at the plant. Cross-contaminationkidney failure and mans best friend was gone. Three days of bloodand piss and shit and lost eyes wandering in the parts of the househe had never been allowed to go. Three days of bewilderment at abody he couldnt control.