SUBMERGENCE

Her voice sent a message

that I could not yet make sense of, though knowing I was impacted

Something inside of me knew it made sense

as I sat on the sofa next to six of my kin

music, the only way to sense my identity in the row of resemblance

I had been a piece of a body of work, yet artwork of my own

We sat still underwater,

the apartment on Amboy street our submergence

we did it as a family

A sharp line that would soon dissipate before my eyes appeared in my silent recognition

no one else saying a word about its form

I was unsure if it had been merely an illusion, or if they’d seen it too

May I remind you it was sharp, nothing unseeable

I recognized the sharp focus of one of my uncles,

fixated in the direction of the line that appeared in front of me

He had to have seen it, as his face expressed a stiff concealed concern

as he pretended to focus on his conversation with Terrance, a family friend

he watched, carefully, as if his eyes had drawn the line themselves, the way it broadened into a rectangle without shading

It was as if it were a portal conjured by the music

conjured by Alicia Key’s voice

an invitation I would one day have to accept

our submergence made my reluctance even slower—

that and the intimidating gaze of my uncle—I missed it

Until next time