How I Learned to Translate Shadows

   after Shivani Mehta

I was born with a book for a body. I think there’s been a mistake, my mother said, refusing to hold me despite the appealing firmness of my spine. I was a clothbound hardcover, the shimmering color of my face too slippery to place in the slatted shadows. Look, the nurse said, cracking me open reverently. All my blank pages stuck together with placenta. I will never forget the kindness of her hands patiently perusing my emptiness. Soon I would have to invent my own language from the dark, dusty corner where my mother shelved me. She pretended not to know how to read, though I am sure the nurse gave her instruction. Together they practiced flinging their curled tongues with abandon, molding round vowels in their throats, landing on a soft hum of teeth and lips. Love, the nurse said. I lay, open, between their hands. Book, my mother said. It was the last word she said to me.

Joshua Zeitler is a queer, nonbinary writer based in rural Michigan. They received their MFA from Alma College, and their work has appeared or is forthcoming in Pithead Chapel, HAD, Stanchion, Cutthroat, Midway Journal, manywor(l)ds, and others.