Mari Sánchez Cayuso

Tag: free verse

  • The Synchronicities of Panic

    Bricks. Roof. Trees. Sky.
    Beige. Green. Blue. White.

    Four tangible things.

    I was taught this fifteen years ago, and somehow I have carried it everywhere since. When panic comes, look outward. Name what is real. Give the mind something it cannot argue with.

    A roof is a roof. A tree is a tree. The sky is blue.

    Start there.

    Inhale slowly. Exhale longer.

    Again.

    Panic is strange because even when you know exactly what it is, your body does not care.

    My mind says, I know this feeling.

    My body takes longer to trust me.

    So I pull over.

    I park beneath a tree, lean the seat back, and wait. Because that is what you do. You wait for your body to catch up with what your mind already knows.

    You are okay.
    You are okay.
    You are okay.

    And then panic does this other strange thing to me.

    It takes me backward. Not to one particular day, but to that old maternal terror of loving something I cannot control.

    That fear.

    The one that says, fix it, fix it, fix it, even when there is nothing you can fix in that exact second.

    It makes me younger somehow.

    Not in years.
    In fear.

    So I do not follow it there.

    Bricks. Roof. Trees. Sky.

    Come back.

    There is a bird in the tree above me. I watch it flap its wings, chirp, move from one branch to another. Its entire purpose, for that moment, is exactly that.

    And I envy it.

    Not because it is free.

    Because it is only where it is.

    No yesterday. No next thing. No inventory of everything that could go wrong.

    Just branch.
    Wing.
    Sound.
    Gone.

    Birds are fleeting that way.

    Maybe that is why I notice them when I am afraid. They arrive without explanation and leave before I can ask anything of them.

    And for a second, I follow that instead.

    My breathing gets better. I can feel myself coming back into my body.

    And then I cry.

    Not because I am more afraid.

    Because I am not.

    Because sometimes after all that fear, there is nowhere for it to go except out.

    So I let it.

    I write this down quickly because later I know what I will do. I will be fine. I will get up. I will drive. I will go do whatever comes next.

    And I will say, I had a panic attack, as though those four words could possibly explain what it felt like while I was inside it.

    So I write it now.

    Before I make it smaller.
    Before I forget the fear.
    Before I forget the relief.

    The tree.
    The breath.
    The bird.

    Bricks. Roof. Trees. Sky.

    Come back.

    The bird lifts from the branch.

    And I do too.

  • Inalterable

    I have spent so much time
    trying to become
    someone
    who didn’t love you.

    Nothing changed.

    Except
    the person
    trying.

  • Before It Had to Be Named

    I have never told a man
    I loved him first.

    Not because I didn’t.

    Because I believed
    love should recognize itself
    before it had to be named.

    I thought if it was true,
    it would arrive on your lips
    before it ever reached mine.

    Then you happened.

    For the first time,
    I wanted to say it.

    I carried those words
    like water in my mouth,
    afraid that if I spoke,
    I would lose
    both the water
    and the thirst.

    So I said nothing.

    Instead, I loved you like the wind—

    the wind that finds your face
    before you have opened your eyes,

    that moves through your hair
    and catches in your breath,

    leaving you to wonder
    what your heart remembered
    that your mind could not name.

    It hurts to love you
    because the feeling is real
    and has nowhere to go.

    No place in your life
    where it can remain.

    So I carry it into mornings,
    into songs I cannot finish,
    into every quiet place
    that still makes room for you.

    I have questioned everything else—

    my judgment,
    my timing,
    the meaning of your silence.

    But never this.

    Never the love.

    I only wanted one impossible thing:

    for you to know
    that somewhere in this world,

    you were loved
    by a woman who had never told a man
    she loved him first—

    and still could not bring herself
    to tell you.

    So if, on some ordinary morning,
    the wind finds your face,

    lingers for just a moment
    and catches in your breath—

    let it be enough.

    Let it carry the words
    I could not.

  • Stanza Is the Bone

    A stanza is the bone.

    Nothing—
    not even a life—
    can be carried
    all at once.

    Everything else
    is me
    trying not to come apart
    in public.

    My hand around my ankle

    like I am keeping

    some part of me

    from leaving.

    My body
    wrapped in denim.

    My whole life
    pretending
    this is just a way
    to sit.

    I feel
    so temporary.

    The bracelet.

    The shoe.

    The watercolor flowers
    beneath my skin.

    I needed evidence

    that I was here.

    That I could drown
    inside myself

    and still come up
    breathing.

  • The Fourth Room

    My house has four rooms
    and I have mistaken each one
    for a chamber of the heart.

    The kitchen keeps what burns.
    The bedroom keeps what enters.
    The hallway keeps footsteps
    long after they are gone.

    The last room
    is always closed.

    I tell people
    it is storage.

    I tell myself
    the same thing.

    But sometimes at night
    I hear it beating—

    that low, stubborn sound
    inside the walls,

    keeping the whole house alive
    from a room
    I never open.

  • Notes

    I want to kiss you

    because silence
    has become too crowded
    inside me.

    Maybe

    if I reached
    your mouth

    I could finally learn

    the grammar

    of everything

    you refuse
    to say.

  • Cloud Level

    I keep looking out the window

    because for once

    the world is beneath me.

    Not in a cruel way.

    Just enough

    to remind me

    I am still above

    something.