THE EDITOR

by prudence brooks

THE EDITOR

glares disapprovingly from her gilded Bergere chair
jabbing its pointed feet into the folds of my cranium.
She paves a red ink road over the untouched foxglove 
and rips violas up like weeds claiming that the truth 
is unsightly and unprofitable too. 

My therapist asks me to imagine the editor 
as an object and the first thing that comes to mind 
is a silver colander. It is filled to the brim with secrets 
that refuse to fit through the holes caked in blood, 
or maybe it’s marinara sauce. 
I pray it’s Prego - something soluble. 

All I can do is run water over it religiously.
I am hoping maybe if I disintegrate the blood, 
if I break the secrets down into smaller pieces,
they will slip through the openings with more ease. 
Praying that one day my words will run free 
across the page with no line breaks 
or tabs shifting
or worrying about who’s watching. 

I’m trying not to hate the editor,
because hating the editor is hating myself 
and there’s nothing creative about self loathing.
The editor is not a colander, 
or a red pen, or an asphalt roller. 

The editor is me -
ten years old, being hit hard by my dad 
in front of my friends and trying not to cry 
because I don’t want to look like a baby.

The editor is me -
three years old, rigid
with shock as my mother shrieks at me 
from a hospital bed and the nurse drags
me away by my malnourished wrist. 

The editor is me -
18, pinned down in a cornfield 
and taught the consequences 
of existing as a girl alone 
in a den of lions, 
and the lions are men, 
and the men are always the same. 

But the editor can change. 
The editor can still do anything.

We have all the time in the world to get this right.