Split Tooth

by Tanya Tagaq

We head back to class The teacher squirming his fingers under my panties Under the desk He looks around and pretends he’s not doing it I pretend he’s not doing it He goes to the next girl and I feel a flash of jealousy The air gets thinner and tastes like rot School is over I leave for the arcade Watch out for the old walrus The old man likes to touch young pussy We try to stay away I wonder why nobody kicks him out

Global warming will release the deeper smells and coax stories out of the permafrost. Who knows what memories lie deep in the ice? Who knows what curses? Earth’s whispers released back into the atmosphere can only wreak havoc.

The ice begrudgingly recedes, promising vengeance in a few short weeks. Winter always wins. The sun scoffs. Nothing can stop the cacophony of gluttony and procreation about to ensue.

All children on the cusp of puberty seem to understand that this magic time will end soon. Greeting the future and yearning for maturity and yet planted firmly in the moon.

Before we are born, energy must be woven into spirit and then siphoned into a body. After we die the spirit must be consoled after the trauma of flesh and then unravelled back into energy.

Murder can heal if applied sparingly. Murder can feed us. Life murders us every day.

Snow is fickle. Snow picks itself up and goes wherever Wind tells it to. One element controls the other in a cyclical oblivion. Weather is just the earth’s breaths. Wind is the cold bearer and the death bringer.

Getting old is so gross. Watching people slowly rot is unnerving.

After coming down I will have to hide from my mother for a few hours because she will see the high in my eyes. Her eyes have always known mine. She made them, after all.

Sometimes the eyes are dead and the light is dead and they are only a body. These are the truly dangerous ones, because there is room for a lost spirit to come and enter their vessel to use it to carry out the spirit’s own agenda. Steer clear of these ones.

Foxes are such steadfast and mysterious creatures. If a wolf and a lynx mated, perhaps their love child would be Fox, who seems to embody the uncanny agility and size of a cat coupled with the strength and durability of a canine.

The foxes run. The foxes die. I mourn them, but I understand that there is danger in mourning for those who would not mourn for you in return. Empathy is for those who can afford it. Empathy is for the privileged. Empathy is not for Nature.

We ARE the land, same molecules, and same atoms. The land is our salvation.

Their love for each other was indistinguishable from the hate they felt for themselves. Sometimes children see more clearly than adults. They loved the cycle of self-hatred and forgiveness. They perpetuated a perfect, violent machine. “You must like it.” Smack. “You make me do this.” Smack.

Like a stitch that is continued, a naming could bring back the quirks and knowledge of the deceased. One can love the deceased through the namesake.

The boys are eating pilot biscuits and lard and I am aware this is their dinner. “Always be thankful for all that you have,” my mother told me. There was plenty of famine in the past, in our history. Famine can live in your bones and be passed on to future generations just like your hair colour. There are many ways to be empty.

That Time we lost our hash in the musk-ox rug and laughed until we were crying Biting into orange rinds just because the citrus blew our minds

Parents let children work out their own social problems. I let the experience go down the drain with the water. No point hanging on to such things. Ultimately, in the scope of the universe, this is a small event. Trauma does not choose you, you choose if it is trauma or not, right?

Heal me, fuck me, and work my heart till she beats strong and unafraid. Haunches bared, teeth sharpened, wide-eyed and aware. Hurry. I want to feel safe.

Our minds are our prisons. There are secrets hidden in our flesh. Our cells being born and dying with the same force that makes galaxies form and deconstruct. Context. Perspective. Scale.

I realize that birds see in a completely different way than we humans do. We are slow and lumbering, our language is deep and muddy. Our confinement to the ground elicits pity. They look at us as we look upon the trees, slow but full of longevity. The trees look at the rocks that way. Rocks look at the mountains that way. Mountains look at the water that way. Earth looks at the sun that way. Everyone has an elder.

There is no choice but to endure. There is no other way than to renounce self-doubt. It is the time of Dawning in more ways than one. The sun can rise, and so can I.

We will all be back in the earth soon, why not enjoy being outside of her now?

When asked who the father is, I say nothing. My own father is infuriated. I saw his eyes cloud over and saw that he would never love me in the same way again. He withdrew into himself and never came out again. I no longer have access to his love.

My milk. Milk in breast, Full of womb, Close to tomb.

This kind of life thrives off dying. It is predatory. Leave it to humans to find a way to hunt themselves. This life thrives on taking from one another. This type of life is the opposite of empathy. This is destruction. This is chaos. This is so satisfying.

I watch the molecules grow in my children, and it is a perfect extension of them being inside my belly. They are still inside me, but outside. We are our ancestors.

We cannot always be what we wish to be. I cannot be perfect for my children.

Human nature is undeniable and kindness cannot be contrived, mimicked convincingly, or bought.

Nature is not merciful. Neither is he. He just is. He exists in true form and is unapologetically all-consuming. I am cursed to watch all my loved ones pass away, eaten by my son.

From a long dream ago, I realized that I took them myself, and that suicide blocks one’s journey into the spirit world. The spirit must leave flesh at its own volition. To interrupt means that one has forsaken Time.

What keeps you alive in crisis can kill you once you are free.

I don’t want to leave. I want my life back. There is no help and there is no light as the reality of what I have given up sinks in. The pain is not gone. The regret is forever.

Beat me. I deserve it. Blacken my eyes so they reflect what I see from the inside. Break my ribs. Kick me. Kill me. End this. I am not brave enough to do it myself. All I have is numb.