Hypervigilance
Poems Written Between Denver and Dulles
I wrote some poems on the plane from Denver to Dulles. Here they are.
Reckless Driver Theory
I ask you if you’re a nice guy. You ask me if anyone has ever replied no to that question so I wish I hadn’t asked and decide not to speak until spoken to.
I talked about how my poetry got a lot happier after I broke up with my first love. And he told me he was happy my writing was happier, but he asked if I was happier or just my words were. I felt bad for saying anything at all so I wrote that night until my hand cramped because maybe if I kept the words on the page they wouldn’t hurt anyone, like when you see a reckless driver swerving and decide to stay behind them so you can see any damage they might do. Hypervigilance — is that the concept here?
I described myself as a masochist once to an old friend and she later brought up that I was right about myself. She said I did go out looking for things that could hurt me and then I let them do it. I corrected her I do go out looking for people that I could love and then I let them not love me. She said we were saying the same thing. I agreed.
Instability
It should be illegal to recline airplane seats. You’re infringing on my $456 and in-flight ginger ale. I want to write poems on my offline laptop and listen to the same song 36 times. Maybe then I will be able to recreate the feeling I get when it comes on in public rather than just in my ears. Flying United tastes like spearmint gum and leather. I wonder if all these people are going home or somewhere else. Does it really make a difference? Those two places are starting to feel the same to me. A house isn’t a home without a dog in it, so by that standard I haven’t had a real home since 2018. I lived in stability for so long, counting down the days till I could do anything else. I then tried to do something else but have ended up back where I started. For the next 6 weeks, I will have at least two flights a week, if not 5. I bounce between United and American because I can’t find stability in my instability. On my days at home, I resist using the stability pole at my workout classes, I lunge to 90 degrees on a moving platform and hope I can make it back up. My fear of looking stupid in front of others steadies my balance more than my physical strength. I listen to absurd music now that I take that class. It will be 9am and I will be writing emails alongside the Black Eyed Peas. I will be flying in a plane to someone else’s home and listen to a rap song I know all the words to but don’t remember wanting to learn them.
Practicing Normalcy
Normalcy doesn’t come so easy to me. I’ve spent a lot of time deciding not to be awkward. I dream of spending a whole day playing Billy Joel as loudly as I can on my Bose speaker, dancing everywhere I go and telling everyone I meet you look so beautiful. Can you believe we’re alive today? Why aren’t you dancing? There’s music? Are you in love? Who loves you? Have you told your friends you love them? When did you last call your mom? I’ll talk to her if you ring her now and I’ll tell her we’re having a lovely day dancing in the sun but you would have to start dancing now to make that true. Don’t you just love this song? Can’t you tell what he means when he says, I don’t need you to worry for me cause I’m alright? Doesn’t being alive make you terribly nostalgic for it even though it’s still here? Isn’t it terrible to know it will be gone? When was the last time you cried? It’s gotten harder for me to cry as I’ve gotten older. This is good and bad. I used to cry too much, laying on the tile floor of my family’s kitchen. However, now I will watch a movie and love it so much that I want to cry but I just can’t. Do you ever feel that? Why are you still not dancing? There’s music? Instead of dancing, I wear heels that give me blisters and ask people if they’ve read that Princeton study about IQ points and stress and lack of sleep. I don’t sleep in a hotel in New York. I don’t sleep in a hotel in Colorado. I can’t believe this is normal, but everyone else seems to go along with this. So I do too. I order room service and they call the black room phone to tell me it’s ready. Are you bringing it to my room? I ask and they say I didn’t request that when I called, but when I called I asked for room service which has the word room in it. Maybe one day I will know how to live and to speak to hotel restaurant employees on the phone. Or maybe normalcy is the biggest lie life has ever told. Being alive isn’t normal. It’s the strangest thing that will ever happen to any of us. But maybe you don’t get that.
Waiting v. Being
I’ve waited so long that now waiting feels like being. I put lotion on after my shower and think that someone will appreciate this effort someday. But maybe that someone is me.
Becoming
Are you really gonna slick back your hair? You’re becoming the person we both said we didn’t like. I wonder how you explain this to yourself and everyone else. Maybe growing up is losing respect for everyone you’ve ever known and their name brand sneakers and their 3 voicemails in response to something you texted them two weeks ago and their infinite desire to be noticed. I know I do a lot of things in pursuit of being loved, but being loved is a better goal than being seen. I donated that knit dress to Goodwill and there’s now a receipt in front of our picture stuck in the corner of my mirror. The receipt’s from a bar where a man ran his thumb over the rip in my tights that I got standing on the side of the interstate with you.
The Warehouse Floor
The CHRO has been having a problem with 20-year-olds dying on the warehouse floor. She doesn’t know what to say when their families call asking if there’s money to bury their son. I don’t have a solution for death, only one for financial wellbeing which seems silly now. Most things seem silly when sat next to death. When we finish, there are pastries in the ballroom and sparkling waters in the corridor. We take shuttles to the airport and submit expense reports for room service and lattes with oat milk. You never think it will be you. I sit in a session on AI that proves high performers do worse with AI’s help but low performers will improve their output by 35%. I wonder if I want AI to still be here but technological advances don’t ask your permission for their existence. I wonder if AI can stop the deaths on the warehouse floor because maybe it can take people off the warehouse floor, but then I realize either way life is being taken away. On the flight home, my AirPods are playing at the loudest possible volume because living feels too close for comfort.
sending my love,
caroline mae woodson