discovering the earth is flat

part of getting
older is figuring out
which parts of yourself
are loudest at night--
i'm here listening to
the cobblestones of
broken blood vessels 
up my thighs-- i'm sorry
body for making you
into a welcome mat
to wipe my muddy canvas
shoes on-- 
coming home again is
a process of taking
yourself apart--
learn to love like
shoe laces-- 
at night i lay awake
tired & full of tall-tale
stories not meant to be 
shared-- 
ones about
living on the inside of
my uncle's drum as he
walked down a road in
ireland 
we flow like
a trickle of blood from galway--
before the sun started
to blush tonight i
walked my feet full of blisters
& broke open the ocean 
beneath me as i stomped 
through puddles--
the water was a stained glass
window from the church where
i learned that we hold
god in our right hand--
when we were young we 
sat on the end of
our mother's bed & watched her
change out of her tight
cloths & thought nothing
of nakedness-- only
of the soft smell 
of her lavender-colored 
smell-- like a pretzel knot
of arms keeping you safe--
i have learned to keep
my discoveries 
inside myself but at
night they get louder--
whisper from both sides of
my pillow like two
lovers that i lay between--
i observed when i was very
young that the edge of the horizon
is flat & i'm not sure
what that means because no
matter how far i've gone
i don't think i've fallen off
yet-- i just know there's a ledge 
waiting somewhere over
the dotted yellow lines 
of the roads who get lost
in the corn & the soy beans--
when my mother told me the
earth was round i told
her that i couldn't see
any curve to the edge of
the sky & she told me the earth 
was too big to see a curve--
i'm still skeptical--
i look up old nautical maps
where giant ships spill off 
into the mouths of great beasts 
with elbows full of scales--
& the sensation of falling can
be so loud in my body 
that the pillows shatter
like puddles or stained
glass windows--
i scratch myself open
like horse hoofs clattering
on the stone roads through boston
that are too small to be
real-- 
my body becomes loud
about its smallness & about the smallness
of the earth-- how
dare we think we had escaped
the inevitable
ledge just because the earth
is a sphere-- the earth is
flat when you go too
far in one direction-- i wipe
my feet again 
on my hip bones-- ring
a door bell nestled in
my collar bone where you
learn to kiss me-- when 
i finally prove to you
that the earth is flat 
all things will be quiet 
then-- it will be morning & 
the sun will be back to 
cast shadows between 
our ribs-- what we keep 
lock in our own rib cages is
no one's business but our
own-- i get louder
& louder 
sprawled out
at night 
on the edge of my bed which
is also the drop off 
the side of the earth--
water gushes & sizzles
against hot pin pricks of stars--
i fall & for a second 
everything is louder
than a broken stained glass
window or the rapture
of a single blood vessel 
on my thigh--