RELIGION, ANOTHER INDEX

elizabeth shorkey

A

AARDVARK

Not a jackalope.

Creationist theory says it’s a cross between a pig, a rat, a donkey, and an anteater: but I believe Beelzebub was involved.

ABECEDARIAN

There are no words that begin with double consonants because that would be absurd.

Alternatively, see also AMATEUR. I remember kindergarten, shouting out our names, hoping for an Anna or Nevaeh: palindromic or conveniently anagramic.

ABSTINENCE

The act of not acting on impulses that drive you to the movies or buy you food

food is a good placater, it makes you do stupid things

like sex, apparently.

Making parents proud by keeping them young while you fish for rings in pools of suitable suitors.

Not being desirable.

Acting like the backdoor isn’t sex.

Acting like an arch-child who's never been saved by red-dipped panties.

Acting like a normal, horny playboy—pulling at closet doors, priests pulling at you.

ANTEDILUVIAN

I think too much about my mother dying. She texts and drives, which worries me. But if I text her and she doesn’t respond quickly, I worry more. She is too caring, and the world devours people who care.

I think too much about the world devouring my mother.

Do all cats go to heaven? Would they even like it there? I don’t know.

Not knowing worries me.

ARK

Smelly.

AMATEUR

No one masters life. Thus everyone is an amateur, pretending to be an expert, hoping nobody notices that they have used the same explanations for the creation of the earth as why God hates gay people.     

B

BARRACKS (see also: PALACE and GUARDING and ARK.)

A place for soldiers to sleep when there isn’t dying to be done.

Holy wars run on blood and oil, not water.

BROTHEL

There are legal brothels in eight counties in Nevada.

There are brothels in every county in Nevada.

Men want to keep their daughters out of their brothels.

Brothels are completely legal in Australia.

Olivia has credible information that her home in Duluth was originally a brothel:

“Ghosts fucking each other every night.”

BROTHER

I do not have a biological brother, but I imagine my hypothetical brother would not be much different from my younger sister for she is crude and ARK, as well.

Men see this differently than me:

Men run into burning buildings to save strangers: brothers.

Men fight wars with strangers: brothers.

Men start wars because of strangers: brothers.

Men kill strangers.

Men rape strangers.

  Brotherhood is a complicated thing. Perhaps I’ll create my own definition:

A bear.

C

CENSUS (see also: ORDER and ABSTINENCE)

In the gym:

    The curtain is brought down painfully slow, separating the room in two. Boys on one side, girls on the other. The boys got the side with the windows.

As the girls are plunged into darkness, we are silent. A teacher turns the light on and a wail erupts from the boys. Again, we are plunged into darkness. The boys quiet.

The vagina, penis, period, ejaculation—we are all silent. We file out for recess and speak only in hushed giggles, afraid of the stiffness of underwear, of members.

We are the christened women.

E

EKPHRASIS

She sat on the other side of the classroom but I could see her perfectly.

She was not attractive. But she was not ugly.

Her face attracted light, illuminated, better suited for a transfigurative painter to depict her.

She reminded me of the Renaissance paintings projected before us.

Her hair was stringy, brown, better suited for underwater travel like a blue lipped mermaid, short of breath.

Her eyes were ringed in red, not rosy, better suited for plague, for the blotchy coloring of death.

Her face was puckered, pale and bloated, but not fat, better suited for a hennin, black, no, a white truncated version—lace veil, scratch the veil.

G

GARLAND

Hanging from the cross on Christmas, eggnog with cinnamon in plastic cups, spiced cider stickying the hands of small, white children and old wooden pews.

Adorned with holly, draped in windows and over doorsteps with bits of mistletoe, malice, old man stooping to sixteen, going on seventeen broad. She was asking for

the night to be over already. How long is labor?

GOODBYE

It’s all temporary, darling. That is all. We shall not expand.

Everyone is too hung up on this. If all is short lived, if all is futile, if our second chance waits in purgatory, or if we are to live life here and hope for the best as you’ve told me, why do we worry so much?

When you die, we will say we will see you again:

but we don’t really know that, and that scares us:

so we say we will see you again so that others will do the same for us.

GAY

I do not pretend to know. I only point to who I love and hope they feel the same.

Being happy in your own skin, tasting sweet words with an open mouth at the feet of those who tried to break you.

We kissed in her room, we were standing and draped in coats

because we had made it snow that day. Yellow, we wore yellow and fuzz collected between our lips. 

With our tongues

we braid a scarf between our teeth and chatter against my cold nose. She holds me like a petal by frost,

waiting for me to darken, so I darkened against her bitten fingertips.

H

HOSTEL

Sactem Real, I think that was the band. They play so loud, hoping God will listen. I could feel the ground shuddering. My blood quivered. I was surely going to meet the zombie-man they cried blood for tonight. The guitarist smears his red tears on the forehead of the drummer. I cringe.

Hostel of the Sun in Italy is a five minute walk from the Palace of the Immacolatella. I’ve had my trip planned for years, a plan to ease into leaving. My mother cried when I said Puerto Rico. I do not remember my plan anymore.

HOTEL (see also, HOSTEL, BROTHEL)

Where I met my first black leather bible,

    suicide notes were pinned to the pages and tucked under pillows

    sweet dreams, Lilac Lav.

A door stop for foot soldiers with feather fetishes;

watch them cram wads of cash between their teeth

like stockbrokers and temple taxmen;

consume them, how filling.

L

LOVE

Yes. Solomon loved Daniel. Very much, it seems. I’ve learned to cradle Solomon’s halves of severed lead bullets for he is headed for the guillotine early tomorrow morning by my hand.

People say, very often, that Aubrey and I will grow to love each other in a proper, sisterly way when we are older. That we will value each other's company as age grips us under the arms and plants its feet to the sides of our eyes. I am doubtful, I don’t say this, it will make it more fun when we prove them wrong.

I refuse to write love poems.

LAVISH

To pour out appreciation for _______  in waves of affection.

Commonly seen demonstrated by lovers who cheat at love, loving the idea of their partner.

Example. Yes, John is a neurosurgeon, we will be getting married after his residency, he’s already bought me a ring.

“Oh?”

Though the other woman hasn’t said it, she finds a future for John and the first-time fiancé unlikely, at best.

O

OPAL

The name of the Protagonist from Because of Winn-Dixie.

She took the Sad Candy and handed it out to everyone in the town.

I had thought she wanted everyone to feel real sadness, like she had,

but now I think it is because she wanted the town to share

in sadness through candy,

something not inherently sad.

Hydrated silica.

ORDER see also: CENSUS

Back in the gym:

we are determining extrovertedness.  Three groups, no halvsies, for social situations: do you:

A)  approach people,

B) wait to be approached, or—I leave.

Routers direct digital traffic in computers, it sorts packages of information so that they come in the correct—they can be confusing and hard for the recipient to understand unless they knew the original—if these packages are not in their intended—

P

PALACE

194 occurrences.

Also see: BARRACKS [6 occurrences].

Also see: GUARDING [16 occurrences]

Point: heaven has gates, and that is enough to keep the rough edges out. Ruffians must mellow in death. Perhaps Lucifer makes chamomile tea at noon. I had my first Biscoff at 17. A true evil.

X

XENOPHOBIA

My father and I discuss politics at the table after Aubrey storms out and my mother is late arriving home. I use big words that don’t fit in his mouth. I feel powerful. Today, I have a glass of wine in front of me. I do not feel special, as I assume he wanted me to.

The glass has the film of toothpaste on the top, but it doesn’t come off when I take my nail to it––it must be a part of the design.

We talk of immigrants the way white people do. I take the side of the people

with sewn mouths. My father is not the white man on TV. My father will listen. My father will listen.

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