Reckoning Between Liminal Space & the Exasperating Pause
Why do we become so invested in newness—
random shifts in thinking?
And you, as well. Because when I look at you—
your body, exposed but not actually,
shrouded in this tacit kind of insult,
like an inverse of everything I feel
spilling out,
this brash hum in my chest.
Eyes pressed tight against the light,
face stiff—like a wire pulled too tight,
windshield cracking in the storm.
Stillness tamed?
I’m not pretending.
But I’ve tried.
I’ve tried with my mouth full of mistakes,
those old words that never quite fit,
always peeking through the window of past missteps.
How do you move through the wreckage?
What do you do with the broken pieces of choice?
How do you remain standing in the ruins and call it home?
I wonder if peace even exists—
perhaps it’s just something people say
who haven’t realized
how quickly everything can fall apart.
Philosopher? Nah.
I’m just a collector—
a scavenger for broken ideas,
scraping at whatever’s left,
bits that don’t make sense together.
Delving through every mistake,
muddle and density,
my hands buried in old dust,
hoping I can put something back together—
maybe whole, maybe not.
But my hands don’t work that way.
The story falls apart:
the towers I’ve built collapse at my feet.
I walk into it—the mess, the drama.
Searching for what hasn’t been said.
Feeling the space between everything.
Words that won’t come out,
too scared to speak.
It’s there, right?
That look in others’ eyes—
it’s a reflection, isn’t it?
Cutting through the noise
of a war that can’t be won.
A word we can’t name,
can’t own.
The evidence is there,
but the answers?
We’re not ready for them.
I wonder—am I the only one asking?
A question without a place,
drifting through systems that don’t know
what to make of me.
Some nights, I want to be a period—
a simple, final end,
the comfort of knowing when it’s over.
But instead, I’m the comma,
a syntactical liminality birthed,
a question barely hanging there.
Does the world ever stop
long enough to catch me?
Is it fear, the shadow of facing this,
or the strange feeling
of moving through the nameless?
I’m still trying—
slowly,
to let the questions just be,
not gripping them too tight.
To stand in the dark without begging for light
to explain it all.
Yes, sometimes I see you—
a silent bridge
without a code.
Maybe stuck in the spaces
between sounds?
Maybe crossed over—what is that line?
Maybe I’ve found something
on the other side,
where silence isn’t empty
but a warmth that somehow makes sense.
If we’re all just
holding our breath,
waiting in this pause,
neither here nor gone,
waiting for gravity
to do its thing,
shaping us into something
we long to eventually
call real.
——
Superfly Cool in the Wonder Years of the Ghettoverse
I wonder if Pops will lie out in his trademark bell-bottoms—faded denim flares that split the air like his cool, bending time, making room for his strut as if the horizon would yield to his next step.
He sported them tightly creased—dividing time into his own image and fashioning it into a tailored jacket. Double-breasted pinstripe blazer, a jazz-filled dream, every stitch belting out the bridge of a Wednesday night 12-inch serenade.
This walking storehouse of juke joints, Motown discs and blaxploitation films, disturbing memories the way vinyl records scrape like grooves—deep enough to envelop the sun. Maybe that’s why he was always sleeping with an afro pick stuck in the crown of his hair—an Israelite warrior anchored to the ground in his mane.
Real talk, he kinda reminded me of Mr. Soul Train—swagger oozing from platform heels like honeycombs, a disco dancing machine of something more memorable than the slow curve of a woman’s hips. Moonwalking across the kitchen floor, stirring the stars with a spin, kissing wax.
“Ice cream man, ice cream man—I need a quarter real bad to buy the fine shorty down the block one of them sun-kissed dreamsicles with a smile to match.” In my head, I call her baby-girl, and when she catches sight of me she blushes… in my head.
My sister burned the grits this morning and I was hella mad. Okay, I’m frontin’—I’m still mad. I’ll bet Mama’s hot comb and my new Sunday loafers she did it on purpose—shaming her own canvas like a maestro just to see if the mess bloomed to beauty. She’s been grounded for three days, but still pitches fits like seeds, observing what kind of anarchy sprouts from rebellion.
Mama just told me, “Boy, let it go”—but how do you let go of burnt grits? Of a sister with the face of a permanent-marker grin? I’d give her the silent treatment, but she’d jam it full of smugness, mocking my rebuke like Double-Dutch ropes skipping rhymes: “Down in the alley where the garbage grows…”
Pops would call this a teachable moment. “Life’s like a pot of grits—you gotta stir it just right or it’ll stick to the bottom.” Then he’d slap me on the shoulder with aftershave and talcum powder scented hands, leaving the smell of him on my skin, like a paternal signature.
Later, I’ll practice my two-step in the driveway, fingers crossed that baby-girl walks by. I’ll spin imaginary records in my head: James Brown for the rhythm, Marvin Gaye for the soul. If she smiles, I’ll c-walk like Pops, dancing on the tightrope of cool and catastrophe.
Inside, my sister mutters vengeance under her breath—steam from the boiling kettle rising like a menace, a haze thick as the dough outside: bell-bottom jeans swish then sway, ice cream trucks blast their hypnotic melodies, and me, stuck between a dream and the long, slow simmer of a comeback.
——
Poetry (c) DJ Benhaim
Image: ChatGPT remixed