locked, falling; for generations

i imagine two eagles, talons locked, falling to something like death,
but not death– it’s something hard against the walls of your lungs
and the chambers of your heart, and they are falling in love.
they are falling into sex, and into life together, new bodies
that will sprout from their own. they are so loud in their love,
and they are echoes of their parents, making echoes.

this loudness collapses my eardrums, and the world around me
gets a little more quiet, but my head doesn’t. i only hear
the voices i’ve known– every piece of the collage, of the stained glass
masterpiece i’ve been patching together since i fell out of my mom’s
melted, drooping body– messy and hot and fleshy,
burning red like a glazed monster emerging from a kiln.

i hear you standing in front of me on the court,
telling me to follow through, pounding a leathery
ball into the heat-warped blacktop, over and over, sounding
like a beating heart. i hear my own heart beat in my ears.

i hear my labored breathing, her perched up on her elbows,
the rest of her collapsed on me– straddling, crying together.
we are loud, and she looks like a pretty little bird, and i’m grinning
with every tooth out– little garlic cloves, fucked up
and pearly.

i hear charlie’s leash jingle as he walks in the house,
my little body squealing and running to him,
and he barrels into my arms. he is golden between my little fingers,
searching his fur so carefully, as if i was blind– as if i hadn’t touched him
in a million years– so i could grasp at the comfort of his cloudy body.

i hear stories i’ve never felt or known, feel it all against my hot skin,
overwhelmed, sensing everything. i know my great-great-great grandparent’s
memories in my muscles, like an eagle cartwheeling through the air,
and i feel it all bubble over. i am a boiling pot too full,
and my children will be even fuller.