Bones

The human skeleton is created with 270 bones but overtime some bones fuse together until there are only 206 left.  That's 64 bones that morphed into 64 other bones. 64 parts of the human puzzle that go unnamed against the flesh. 

I'm afraid of becoming a lost bone. 

So I protect my fragile parts. And, some days I almost feel like I've been so broken the splinters under my lifelines count as added bones in the palm of my hand. I take stock of the excess, convinced by consumerism that it is better to have more. But then I think about it again.

I think about how our bodies evolve. How they get more elaborate, more capable, with time. I'm so adverse to conforming to the herd-mentality that I never take a step back to appreciate the other bones or-better yet- work alongside them.  

I bet bones are never frightened of being lost. 

But we are. In big cities, we dress in couture, in hats, in trash bags, all in the name of not going unnoticed. It's like the first rounds of American Idol auditions: So convinced we, alone, are not "enough" that we cover our bones in our thickest skins and practice personas. If we know who we are, we're lucky. But we probably don't share those parts with many people. Individuality is sacred---and secret. 

In a poem by Cecilia Llompart, she writes;

“There are bones

waiting for names in the graveyards.

Even the sun above us is dying, one
landed repetition of light at a time.” 

If bones were like trees, we could cut them open to reveal rings. Instead we wear our rings on the outside, symbols of promise- of possessiveness. All the while, spouting prose on how we can be alone. 

I like solitude. But as age makes my bones brittle, I'm realizing how important it is not to be alone. To make eye contact with a person and smile, to laugh at a joke, to hug, to love. The words flow so simply but it all comes at a cost.

When you look at a person, it's the moment before you look away.

Or a smile quickly melted to a frown.

The way your body shakes, with hours of uninhibited laughter, that's how it topples over and cries.

Hugs leave bodies cold, in the aftermath of affection. When our favorite hugs are shared with other, it fills our chests with icicles. Those are the harshest winters, the ones we watch play out around us.

Like love- to freely give up your heart is bare-bones vulnerable. It's the skeletons in our closets, it's knock-knees and pelvic thrusts and entangled lives. It's everything we fear the most. All 206 of our most fragile parts.

If there are bones waiting for names in graveyards, I hope it's long before the names of the people I love etch the bones of time. Before they disappear.