Vladimir Nabokov describes Toska as “a
dull ache of the soul, a longing with nothing
to long for, a sick pining, a vague
restlessness, mental throes, yearning”.
I understand now what a room can do to a
body, to a spirit, the shape of fossils change
when turned in the hand too long, I saw myself
with water, felt compelled to rest my feet in
the sea’s grass, the more glory to sway in with
the hips, you need a bigger hill to die on
though and a string quartet to go down with, I
remember how we bumped blue bodies,
rubbed lips till they bled, imagine if you had
wanted the crown of my head cupped in your
hand for centuries, my body and all its
determined salt, I didn’t mind your fingers
slipped into the gashes, shrinking to fit the thin
stems of flowers pulled up with roots, in the
ancient stone burial chamber of four in the
morning I ran my hands along the splitting
geology of an hour and wondered whether I
would be the cat or the Egyptian in the next
life, gloriously hooked out of myself through
the nasal canal, embalmed in olive oil and old
air, to be admired in glittering expiry for a
thousand years, but who am I to deserve such
eternity, it would be easier to think of space
and the ocean as two thaumaturgic kingdoms,
the diaphanous habitat of the middle ground
being the only place humans can survive with
breath, that should be enough but it is a
hominoid distraction to fetter and yoke what
resists, one thing I didn’t say, blistering in my
revenge dress on your sandstone doorstep, you
framed by light, the only time I ever saw you
look like the word surrender, I was tired of
being held in the fluid of things I could not
submit.
Amelia Theodorakis is a poet from Melbourne working on her debut collection. Her poems have appeared in Meanjin Quarterly, Australian Poetry Journal and Cordite Poetry Review, among others. Her poetry contains a deep regard for the landscapes of love, grief and self-renewal. You can find her on Instagram: @amthe_