BIG little soul
It means something to FEEL a thing
Not the word; not the definition but the noise it makes inside you—
Big little soul my mother called me
Big little soul
They said
“Well, emotions are the product of past life misery”
Desperate, I again asked:
“I’m just an adult in a child size body?”
the answer always: “Yes”
This is your life.
My life?
Years later after they reviewed and viewed
my mother as: Probably Degraded and I found her
on the streets half-mad with belief
I reached back to our years of bleak labor, uniforms & statistics,
the blank stares of dreamless children —
the corridors dim and rancid
It takes as long as 10 seconds between
a European man chasing purity pouring water over the sauna coals
and the rush of Hellfire steam in our eyes, our lungs–
the stumbling out, the fighting for breath
The woman screamed: “Get back in the box.
Do you want to be a tiger or a dilettante? “
A tiger she would answer for herself
The hours spent sweating out my child sized body’s poisons while
each day passed outside: the shrieks of school yards
letting out, humming cars and raucous nights
The adult sized bodies described them as:
drugged up, degraded, all living criminal lives,
and I was empty inside except for the silent wishing
to be happy someday and made of such things
The sauna gave me fevers, gave me heat and wet
and everywhere around me the skin of adult sized bodies
pressed against the skin of my child size body—the heat
rising to the high bench — the only space I had left
As Florida grew thick
I learned when you live in a hotels garage while being “redeemed”
shame is hotter than a sauna
The sauna was underground
and entered through the bowels of the building
low and deep, and it darkened with each step down
The garbage room decayed around the corner
covered us in its stench when the door was opened
The black & blue filed by heads down, tending the waste
as I listened to the adult sized bodies
forcing me awake, forcing me to drink, forcing me to run
my lids hung heavy in the air humid and buzzing around me
Dizzy, they said to drink and drink and drink more water
“Swallow/run/sweat/report”
Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.
I sometimes dreamt my name meant something —
as if big little thetan was my power
Years later desperate, alone—I asked:
“You mean I can just crash on your couch?”
And he answered: “Yes”
Adding that he had things and drinks in the fridge he would make us..
I didn’t ask the price
There must be exchange
The woman who pushed me back inside
the sauna yelled my full name when she called me
“Mother” became the name
I didn’t speak of except for inside me
Today I celebrate my mother’s smile—
when I visit—
and I know this means she recognizes me
I now understand I had no power
I want Scientologists to live
through WWIII but crime is what is never named:
the outside full of poison
But I can’t control the fever rising, I fall asleep and wake
with the woman standing, yelling —
her adult sized body looming over me;
the Hellfire steam,
the sweat and stench and poison
“Do you know what we call people who aren’t saving the planet? Degraded!”
and I start awake and am standing inside the sauna —
nothing near me but secrets and sweat
Degraded. They said.
They said: save the world but —
Let it mean something to feel a thing
Let big little souls feel a thing for as long as 10 seconds
Let a thing listen
Let me listen to the love that took two decades to find me
Let it mean something to feel a thing
About the author
Yikes. I can relate. Thank you.