A Hundred Lives

after Jessica Abughattas

In my first life,

I was a single grain of salt stuck to the tip of sea’s tongue. I stung at all eyes, spasmed every throat, tried my best to strip all skin of death but only recalled their wounds. In my next,

I harbored feathers and a throat that called and called men out of their hearth-warm homes and into the brine. I was craggy shore, ship wrecker, hurricane. In one life,

I was a boy with wings, dirt beneath nails, scrapes on my knees. I know this because of the way my limbs bend askew to reach the earth. I know this because as a child, I insisted you all address me as Mark, Frank, or Han, and in a coven of girls at play, I was always the boy. In one life,

I was Han Solo. In another,

Frodo Baggins, and I threw DOWN in Mordor, have the burn scars to prove it. In my next life,

I was a pearl. Graze your teeth down my neck and you can still feel the grit, taste the sweat from my post-nacre life where I

was a courtesan. At least I wanted to be, but likely, I was too reserved to be that free. Likely, I was married off to a wealthy bachelor down the cobblestone street, and it was not passion, it was not seagulls crashing through morning or planets in alignment, but oh, he was good and he was good to me and how can I complain about what is simple and good? About silk and lace, weekends in Bath and patisserie in Paris, lilac-covered balconies overlooking the Seine?

Have I always been a shelled thing? The first time I died was at the stake,

and I’ve been spawning from ash ever since. A woman scorched. I am no longer afraid of fire. In every life,

I have been either a Pisces or a Cancer. I like to believe that in just one,

I was a Scorpio. Think that’s why I keep going up in flames, wrapping my ribs in ebony, writing poems that sting more than heal. In my darkest life,

I forgot how to sing, unhollowed my throat by swallowing stone, and in this life,

I’m still coughing up marble. Still oiling the creaks in my vocal chords. And one day I will hurl my voice over forests, over seas, into the conch ear of a lover. For now,

I make do with my hands: the way they graze what they love and grab what they want; collar their fingers in trinkets where I carry my siren songs until I am ready to release them back to the sea; vomit ink until they heave and shake and speak so that in my next life,

I don’t come back a cicada cursed to sing all the poems I wasn’t brave enough to write, in this life, for cochleas that will not understand them.

• Meet the Author
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Kait Quinn

Kait Quinn (she/her) was born with salt in her wounds. She flushes the sting of living by writing poetry. She is the author of four poetry collections, and her work appears in Reed Magazine, Watershed Review, Anti-Heroin Chic, Slippery Elm, and elsewhere. She received first place in the 2022 John Calvin Rezmerski Memorial Grand Prize. Kait is an Editorial Associate at Yellow Arrow Publishing and a poetry reader for Black Fox Literary Magazine. She enjoys repetition, coffee shops, tattoos, and vegan breakfast. Kait lives in Minneapolis with her partner, their regal cat, and their very polite Aussie mix.

kaitquinn.com

• & Still Your Indian Paintbrush Mouth
• A Hundred Lives