Ars Poetica
Title: That Sadness of Mine
Author: wicked_sassy
Summary: Kara survives with the help of poetry.
Characters: Kara Thrace (with mentions of Socrata Thrace, Zak Adama, Lee Adama, Bill Adama)
Rating: PG-13
Length: ~1200 words
Warnings: child abuse; adolescent and adult sexuality; lots of angst
Author Notes:
1)This is for kag523, who asked me to write this story.
2) The numbers in parentheses refer to the poem's footnoted citations.
Kara wore long sleeves when she was young; she didn't like answering questions about the purpled bruises on her arms. Even when Socrata was investigated, the woman lied with buoyant grace, blowing pungent clouds of smoke and locking Kara in her room. Socrata's love was like a howling tornado. Her mother punished her, no matter what she did, so she stopped trying to please her. Her father fled the wind and left nothing but music and a silver ring.
School was a refuge. She loved to spend time in the library full of old books, dragging her fingertips lightly along their cracked leather spines. She quietly excelled in her math classes and avoided eye contact. Ms. Ayala was the arts teacher. Kara had watched her peeling the rind from an orange, sucking each golden crescent as she dropped dirty paintbrushes into jars.
When Socrata smashed her fingers, Kara shrank into herself, arms in their light blue casts crossed over her chest. Ms. Ayala saw Kara struggling, unable to do more than spatter color on her canvas. After dismissing class one day, Ms. Ayala beckoned to Kara, asking her to stay back. The teacher was no stranger to wounded children, having been one herself. She patted a stool for the young girl to sit by her desk, then held a book out to her. “Please, honey. Take it. I covered it in a paper bag like your school books so your mom doesn't notice. Keep it, okay? It will help you. Things will get better, I promise.”
It was a book of poetry, crusted by time, its yellowing pages discolored by oxidized paper clips. Kara kept the roughly covered book, reading it through many times over. The first poem she'd read had scared her: “drop a mouse into a poem/ and watch him probe his way out,/ or walk inside the poem's room/ and feel the walls for a light switch.” (1) She wondered if she was the mouse. Now she understands: she's the cat.
She survived school by listening to angry girl rock and drawing visions from her nighttime dreams of distant places. The book stayed with her. She hid evidence of kisses from her mother and memorized lines to whisper into her lovers' ears: “to move openly together/ in the pull of gravity, which is not simple,/ which carried the feathered grass a long way down the/ upbreathing air.” (2) She gazed in wonder as women unfurled under her touch, smiled hungrily as men writhed in her arms.
The suns rose and set to mark time. She recited poems to herself when she broke curfew, staying out past midnight, sitting on hills overlooking the coruscating urban landscape: “You've walked those streets a thousand times and still/ you end up here.” (3) When dreams drew near, her father's humming voice echoed faintly in a corner of her mind and she shoved it angrily away. She knew it wasn't her fault that he'd left, but there was no forgiveness in his liminality. She comforted herself with verse: “such waltzing was not easy/ we romped until the pans/ slid from the kitchen shelves.” (4)
She saw Ms. Ayala in a temple the day before she left for the rest of her life. Kara's former teacher knelt in front of a sculpture of a warrior woman, her hands upraised in entreaty. Fat beads in alternating cherry red and saffron looped around her wrists. Kara lit a stick of incense and left without a greeting, whispering: “to be among those in the know, / or else be alone.” (5) She was ready to go.
She'd thought she'd found love, and a way to be happy, when she was with Zak. He loved her so calmly, so sweetly. It was too easy. She never told him about the double-dog dare, not wanting to admit she'd frakked things up, just like she always did. That moment of connection when she'd opened the door and met Lee's eyes: “You fit into me/ like a hook into an eye/ a fish hook/ an open eye.” (6) The next day they drove to the sea shore and she smiled brightly, teased her man about his hangover. The wind on the water carried the scent of seaweed. Later, she'd sobbed at Zak's funeral, avoiding Lee's choked sobs, clutching their father's hand. It was her fault he'd died. That night she'd laid on the couch in a sodden stupor and crooned a fragment of a poem to herself: “I think of the bullets that did not kill me,/ but killed my friends--/ they who were better than me because/ they did not go on living...” (7)
When she packed her carryall to bring aboard Galactica, she emptied its residue from her last trip off-world. She upended the bag onto the bed; it oozed a single boxing glove, three keys for lost locks, a tarnished fountain pen, spent matches and scraps of scribbled numbers she'd never called. She crammed in blue and gray uniforms, one photograph, some stogies and protein bars, a few pairs of civilian underwear. Nestled on top was the book of poems, wrapped in a curl of pale silver fabric.
When she put on her Fleet uniform, things did get better. Kara never forgets Ms. Ayala, the bouquet of dried lavender on her desk, the way she gestured with her hands when she talked about art. She thanks Ms. Ayala before she sleeps and pulls the book from its secret place between her mattress and the wall. In the margins are her scribbles in white-inked code to hide from prying eyes.
Before Morpheus embraces her, she beseeches the heavens. She silently recites a list of her dead. After she prays, sometimes she sleeps and dreams. Sometimes she shoves her hand down her Fleet-issued pants and stifles moans of much-needed release, circling a thought to stave off her pain: “that swift and serene/ magnificence,/ before the earth/ remembered who we were/ and brought us down.” (8) She doesn't mind being loud if there's someone there with her. Pleasure comes to visit in her dreams, but never overstays its welcome. Awake, she pummels a punching bag, her mind screaming her grief. “The stars are not wanted now: put out every one.” (9) She won't forget. She chants poetry when she runs, heeding the susurrous of the stanzas as she slams the grit under her heels into the ground.
Kara knows that the Gods exist, no matter what anyone else says. She knows they hear her. “You and I, we are the secret citizens of the city/ inside us.” (10) Kara knows that the Gods exist, but she has seen that they don't always answer. Sometimes they answer and it feels like punishment. Maybe it is punishment. She knows about that.
When Kara closes her fingers around the stick in her Viper, she thinks about her mother. She wears sleeveless shirts now, unconcerned with her scars. Space has no weather. When she flies through the deeps, the rain of shattered Cylon guts doesn't cramp her hands.
Thanks to those who provided prompts! From astreamofstars: a fountain pen, three keys for lost locks, one boxing glove, a dirty paintbrush, spent matches, seaweed on a beach, a hill overlooking the spread of lights of a city at midnight, a quiet library full of old books, and cherry red. From sunshine_queen: a desk, jar, lavender, the sea shore, a holy place, saffron, pale blue, white. From kag523: a faint echo, grit under the heel of a shoe, the scent of incense. From letterstonorah: orange rind, marginalia, buoy, visions, angry girl rock, lavender. From rirenec: a sculpture of a warrior woman, Kara's face as she examines something in wonder, the leather of a book cracking or warped pages stained by the rust of old pins or paper clips.
Poems Cited:
(1) Introduction to Poetry by Billy Collins.
(2) Twenty-One Love Poems by Adrienne Rich.
(3) Antilamentation by Dorianne Laux.
(4) My Papa's Waltz by Theodore Roethke.
(5) I Am Too Much Alone in This World, Yet Not Alone by Rainer Maria Rilke.
(6) You Fit Into Me by Margaret Atwood.
(7) Savage Memories by Yehuda Amichai.
(8) American Smooth by Rita Dove.
(9) Stop All the Clocks, Cut Off the Telephone by W.H. Auden.
(10) The Cities Inside Us by Alberto Ríos.
Author: wicked_sassy
Summary: Kara survives with the help of poetry.
Characters: Kara Thrace (with mentions of Socrata Thrace, Zak Adama, Lee Adama, Bill Adama)
Rating: PG-13
Length: ~1200 words
Warnings: child abuse; adolescent and adult sexuality; lots of angst
Author Notes:
1)This is for kag523, who asked me to write this story.
2) The numbers in parentheses refer to the poem's footnoted citations.
Kara wore long sleeves when she was young; she didn't like answering questions about the purpled bruises on her arms. Even when Socrata was investigated, the woman lied with buoyant grace, blowing pungent clouds of smoke and locking Kara in her room. Socrata's love was like a howling tornado. Her mother punished her, no matter what she did, so she stopped trying to please her. Her father fled the wind and left nothing but music and a silver ring.
School was a refuge. She loved to spend time in the library full of old books, dragging her fingertips lightly along their cracked leather spines. She quietly excelled in her math classes and avoided eye contact. Ms. Ayala was the arts teacher. Kara had watched her peeling the rind from an orange, sucking each golden crescent as she dropped dirty paintbrushes into jars.
When Socrata smashed her fingers, Kara shrank into herself, arms in their light blue casts crossed over her chest. Ms. Ayala saw Kara struggling, unable to do more than spatter color on her canvas. After dismissing class one day, Ms. Ayala beckoned to Kara, asking her to stay back. The teacher was no stranger to wounded children, having been one herself. She patted a stool for the young girl to sit by her desk, then held a book out to her. “Please, honey. Take it. I covered it in a paper bag like your school books so your mom doesn't notice. Keep it, okay? It will help you. Things will get better, I promise.”
It was a book of poetry, crusted by time, its yellowing pages discolored by oxidized paper clips. Kara kept the roughly covered book, reading it through many times over. The first poem she'd read had scared her: “drop a mouse into a poem/ and watch him probe his way out,/ or walk inside the poem's room/ and feel the walls for a light switch.” (1) She wondered if she was the mouse. Now she understands: she's the cat.
She survived school by listening to angry girl rock and drawing visions from her nighttime dreams of distant places. The book stayed with her. She hid evidence of kisses from her mother and memorized lines to whisper into her lovers' ears: “to move openly together/ in the pull of gravity, which is not simple,/ which carried the feathered grass a long way down the/ upbreathing air.” (2) She gazed in wonder as women unfurled under her touch, smiled hungrily as men writhed in her arms.
The suns rose and set to mark time. She recited poems to herself when she broke curfew, staying out past midnight, sitting on hills overlooking the coruscating urban landscape: “You've walked those streets a thousand times and still/ you end up here.” (3) When dreams drew near, her father's humming voice echoed faintly in a corner of her mind and she shoved it angrily away. She knew it wasn't her fault that he'd left, but there was no forgiveness in his liminality. She comforted herself with verse: “such waltzing was not easy/ we romped until the pans/ slid from the kitchen shelves.” (4)
She saw Ms. Ayala in a temple the day before she left for the rest of her life. Kara's former teacher knelt in front of a sculpture of a warrior woman, her hands upraised in entreaty. Fat beads in alternating cherry red and saffron looped around her wrists. Kara lit a stick of incense and left without a greeting, whispering: “to be among those in the know, / or else be alone.” (5) She was ready to go.
She'd thought she'd found love, and a way to be happy, when she was with Zak. He loved her so calmly, so sweetly. It was too easy. She never told him about the double-dog dare, not wanting to admit she'd frakked things up, just like she always did. That moment of connection when she'd opened the door and met Lee's eyes: “You fit into me/ like a hook into an eye/ a fish hook/ an open eye.” (6) The next day they drove to the sea shore and she smiled brightly, teased her man about his hangover. The wind on the water carried the scent of seaweed. Later, she'd sobbed at Zak's funeral, avoiding Lee's choked sobs, clutching their father's hand. It was her fault he'd died. That night she'd laid on the couch in a sodden stupor and crooned a fragment of a poem to herself: “I think of the bullets that did not kill me,/ but killed my friends--/ they who were better than me because/ they did not go on living...” (7)
When she packed her carryall to bring aboard Galactica, she emptied its residue from her last trip off-world. She upended the bag onto the bed; it oozed a single boxing glove, three keys for lost locks, a tarnished fountain pen, spent matches and scraps of scribbled numbers she'd never called. She crammed in blue and gray uniforms, one photograph, some stogies and protein bars, a few pairs of civilian underwear. Nestled on top was the book of poems, wrapped in a curl of pale silver fabric.
When she put on her Fleet uniform, things did get better. Kara never forgets Ms. Ayala, the bouquet of dried lavender on her desk, the way she gestured with her hands when she talked about art. She thanks Ms. Ayala before she sleeps and pulls the book from its secret place between her mattress and the wall. In the margins are her scribbles in white-inked code to hide from prying eyes.
Before Morpheus embraces her, she beseeches the heavens. She silently recites a list of her dead. After she prays, sometimes she sleeps and dreams. Sometimes she shoves her hand down her Fleet-issued pants and stifles moans of much-needed release, circling a thought to stave off her pain: “that swift and serene/ magnificence,/ before the earth/ remembered who we were/ and brought us down.” (8) She doesn't mind being loud if there's someone there with her. Pleasure comes to visit in her dreams, but never overstays its welcome. Awake, she pummels a punching bag, her mind screaming her grief. “The stars are not wanted now: put out every one.” (9) She won't forget. She chants poetry when she runs, heeding the susurrous of the stanzas as she slams the grit under her heels into the ground.
Kara knows that the Gods exist, no matter what anyone else says. She knows they hear her. “You and I, we are the secret citizens of the city/ inside us.” (10) Kara knows that the Gods exist, but she has seen that they don't always answer. Sometimes they answer and it feels like punishment. Maybe it is punishment. She knows about that.
When Kara closes her fingers around the stick in her Viper, she thinks about her mother. She wears sleeveless shirts now, unconcerned with her scars. Space has no weather. When she flies through the deeps, the rain of shattered Cylon guts doesn't cramp her hands.
Thanks to those who provided prompts! From astreamofstars: a fountain pen, three keys for lost locks, one boxing glove, a dirty paintbrush, spent matches, seaweed on a beach, a hill overlooking the spread of lights of a city at midnight, a quiet library full of old books, and cherry red. From sunshine_queen: a desk, jar, lavender, the sea shore, a holy place, saffron, pale blue, white. From kag523: a faint echo, grit under the heel of a shoe, the scent of incense. From letterstonorah: orange rind, marginalia, buoy, visions, angry girl rock, lavender. From rirenec: a sculpture of a warrior woman, Kara's face as she examines something in wonder, the leather of a book cracking or warped pages stained by the rust of old pins or paper clips.
Poems Cited:
(1) Introduction to Poetry by Billy Collins.
(2) Twenty-One Love Poems by Adrienne Rich.
(3) Antilamentation by Dorianne Laux.
(4) My Papa's Waltz by Theodore Roethke.
(5) I Am Too Much Alone in This World, Yet Not Alone by Rainer Maria Rilke.
(6) You Fit Into Me by Margaret Atwood.
(7) Savage Memories by Yehuda Amichai.
(8) American Smooth by Rita Dove.
(9) Stop All the Clocks, Cut Off the Telephone by W.H. Auden.
(10) The Cities Inside Us by Alberto Ríos.