Monday grips a pen
Neurotic scribbles fill a blank page
Second hand
clenches
A fistful of hair
Anxiously stitching and unstitching stories
Tangled in a cat’s cradle
Blue
Black
Red ink
splattered
across
the
page
Monday sprints towards an invisible finish line
Eyes glued on the prize
But life is a relay
And it is okay to take a break,
I remind Monday,
Steadying their morning espresso fueled jitters.
I push away their notebook,
Which they desperately grasp at,
And calmly untie the knots that have piled up in their throat
Unravel them from the trap they’ve woven themselves in
Together we take a deep breath
And begin anew
Tuesday is an abandoned cottage
Overgrown with lush moss
Tucked away,
Deep in the woods.
Monday’s forgotten twin sister—
Her walls have not felt electricity
Surge through its ceilings since its inception
If you ever meet a Tuesday,
remember,
Your fingertips are the first spark to light her rooms.
If her frigid floorboards and vacant windows
Tremble at your touch,
Move slowly and do not rush
Hold her hand in yours
Until she softens
Until the walls of her house
melt into the softness of a Saturday
Wednesday plays improvisational interludes on the piano
He grew up learning to lick wit and comical quips
off cruel knives of truth
Wednesday tells jokes
I desperately wish I had thought of
Juggling jests and one-liners with artful mastery
But if you ever meet a Wednesday
Gulp in air and sink deep
Into the depths of their psyche,
Peer into a hidden treasure trove of wonders untold
If you ever meet a Thursday,
Steal them away
Squeeze them tight
Never let them go—
Friday pushes through the chaos of the crowd
And pulls my body close
He drinks in the sin that drips from my skin
His teasing whispers play hide and seek in the crevices of my ear drums
Leaving lingering words that I cannot decipher
Words that I cannot remember
Words that I need not remember
I feel Friday’s hot breath caress the small of my back
He is on his knees in prayer
May our Heavenly Father forgive us of all our sins
Our clothes molt off like dead skin
As his hands bind around the song in my voice
In the morning,
He says he is still drunk
Drunk on love
Or lust
And when he leaves,
His desire is left stained on my neck
Saturday is soft crunch of fluttering footsteps
shuffling through freshly fallen snow.
She is the muffled thud of snowballs
And childlike giggles while hiding behind snowmen
She is a flurry of energy,
the kindest of all her siblings.
Saturday lies by me patiently,
Watching me
As I watch the 6 pm sunset
turn to a star-studded sky
And as shooting stars cascade down to earth
Like awkward kisses land on icy lips
Saturday carves herself into the snow
An angel-shaped space
I make a silent wish—
that the earth too will remember the curvature of her body
Even long after the snow melts
Sunday waits
on the front steps of my porch
in the foggy hours of the early morning
I hurriedly pull up the heels of my sneakers
Slip on the left sleeve of my coat,
And slam a mahogany door behind me
Sunday grunts as he stands up to greet me
Knees creaking,
bones aching
You’re older than time itself, I taunt as I wrap a warm scarf around him
Stuffing the empty space around his neck
Sunday speaks to me in Sunday’s voice
Solemn
Tired
Wise
I grab Sunday’s hand,
He follows begrudgingly
Together, we trod reluctantly towards a new beginning
Each step heavier than the last.
We find a quiet park bench
That fits the two of us perfectly
I tell the same joke my dad always used to tell me,
But I can’t remember the punchline
He tells me he’ll sleep when he’s older
We sit comfortably
Until it is time for Sunday to leave.
I thank Sunday for stopping by
And wait on this bench
For an anxious Monday to hurry by
