I Face the Blue

I Face the Blue

Jacqueline Cleaveland

“...Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water."- John 7:38

It is color of a blind eye,
and of a ghost’s howl.
It is color of summer-laden
magnolia leaves,
and birds
with broken wings,
It is the color of the wallpaper
in a ranch-house bedroom
amidst a field of grass, stiff
and yellow from the sun
at high noon.
It is the color the undulating aquatic,
of flame and chill,
of atmosphere and infinity,
of our corpses, of virgin blood.

I submerge my body,
fluid saturates my tears,
the Sun dies for me, leaving
only blue,
this blue creeps,
it enters
my crevices and deficiencies,
it fills
underneath
my fingernails,
within
my ears,
behind
my knees, under
my feet.
Melancholy and ache
are made commonplace,
for all is blue.

Holy water raises up
my tangled hair 
as if I am being painted
alive. 
Starry starry night, 
I have been baptized. 

---

Jacqueline Cleaveland
Poet and journalist

Jacqueline enjoys honoring her local Los Angeles community's history by writing for the Hidden Hills magazine and earned her B.A. in Creative Writing from Pepperdine University. Her poetry has been published in Expressionists magazine and elsewhere. In her free time, she rides horseback in the Simi hills. 

Photography by Shana Van Roosbroek