body body body

Lying on my back, the sky a clear blue where thin twisting wisps of pale cloud catch a scrap of rainbow. A rainbow. A tiny patch of colours, to make you hold your breath in wonder. There’s a bank of grass, a small scrubby tree, gracing the patchy green with a little hesitant shade. Some of the earth is bare, some of the grass is dry but still, that feeling of lying back on the grass in careless Summer is magically unchanged. It’s quiet. I let my attention sink through my hot body into the cool earth. Blades of grass print themselves into sun-softened skin.

I breath more slowly and notice where the edges of me mingle with the crust. My head rocks on the clumpy earth and a small arc allows air to pass softly under my neck. I listen and feel – I allow the grass to tickle me gently in place. I lie perfectly still and sink into silent sensation. Tiny feet thread their way across my shoulders and the urge to wriggle is visceral. I focus on each moving line and wonder whether stillness in this ticklish touch would ensure increasing numbers of journeymen would whisper their way over all the singing light lines of my shoulders and back… Delicious torture.

I lie quiet and wonder how long I could bear to be touched in this way, unintentionally, knowing the salt warmth of my skin is appealing in unsensual ways to these tiny walkers. I tingle all over. The trails blaze their fine fire over my wrists, travel up the inside of one lazy limb, make their irresistible way to my elbow, to the secret inside of the crook of my arm, to the silkily untouched armpit… I swoon! This touch means nothing, means this prone body, leaning back in the grass has thrown itself into the path of creatures far too busy to tease with pleasure, to light with fire, to tingle into life…

They simply pass over, under, going resolutely about their business, causing an unsettled frisson as they pass. I lie still and let them go, gazing upwards into the brilliant blue, wondering idly how many of them it would take to carry me off to their boudoir. A soft smile, a shred of rainbow, a whisper of goose-bumps, a shiver of desire, a sleepy stretch and my eyes close, contented.

2

Lying on my back I drill my thoughts to consciousness and set about marshalling my efforts. There’s a wound there. It will be tender, and it needs to be known. I pull in my abdomen and push the small of my back gingerly into the hospital mattress. What can I feel? A large area reacts in protest but I’m not buying that. I know how scary you think you are, but you are small. There’s a lot more of me. I hear you - magnified along every fibre, as, metaphorical hands over metaphorical eyes, you try to convince me you’ll be too much to bear. I picture you (and later I will get the nurse to confirm). I know you are small and precise. I single line, incised through soft skin, fastened now by a zip like row - (‘he’s a seamstress!’ says the nurse, impressed by the neat exactitude of his handiwork, laid out precisely equidistant. ‘I’ve done this hundreds of times’) - of 24 staples.

And now my handiwork begins. Don’t be afraid. You’ll feel like handling everything with kid gloves, you’ll think that nothing will ever feel better. You’ll fear this sudden wound, the rudeness of a scalpel having sliced you, and the tube stitched to you with silk sutures to suck out any spare spilled blood. That drain, a heavy plastic bottle with a vacuum top and a tab for carrying, wants to convince you that red, red blood like that is scary and should be on the inside, that pain is frightening and bad. Look at it, though. Busy proving, despite the unseemly shiny richness, that your body is sealing itself off from intruders, flushing their interference out. The container shows clotting, a gelatinous tendency to globules. Clever body – they had to stitch the drain in or you would have cheerfully expelled that, too!

So. Feel around the edges – feel swelling (a little) and tenderness (a lot) but in a very specific place. Check movement of limbs, not everything is hurting. And that is a wonder. A heart bursting joy, life victorious, shouting for attention, resuming where it left off when, unceremoniously, the cover was thrown over the cage, and now – Ta da!! – whipped off with a flourish! Spot the difference. The great reveal! Let’s feel our way… Muscles seem sleepy and slack and I have a tendency to hunch over like a worn out old sack. Necessary? Automatic. Bodies loves to move, so move, so learn the boundaries bravely, stretch out gently and win over the pain, accommodate it kindly within the working organism, firing again, and bringing all cylinders online.

Cough. Breathe. Clear out the befuddling evidence of intruders, and set about maintenance. A brisk assessment of the damage: some poking around has enflamed things but the nerve roots are free. The leg wants to be strong again. The body wants to stand taller. Tilting pelvis gently to and fro reveals the seesaw fulcrum where there’s tenderness, and the languid extension of movement where there is none. Feel for the edges, take it by the hand - we know what to do with you, don’t worry. And don’t make yourself at home because you’ll be going soon – we have no room for permanent pain. We’re all about healing and we want (and don’t take this the wrong way) to move on past you. We’re going on to better without you but you’re welcome in the meantime. ‘You can if you want to Fraulein, we’ll wait for you.’ You do your thing and don’t mind if we do ours. No mind games. You’ve got a big mouth but you’re a small, sleek little wound. You’ll fit right in. No more. No less.

3

Rising onto tiptoes. Slowly, slowly. Listening for the variation between left and right. High hold. Higher. Then slowly, slowly down. Allow the shockwave to pass. Any pain or protest? Again. Push balls of feet into the ground, involving the whole leg as you rise, slowly, slowly onto tiptoe. Hold there. Time to listen left, listen right. All involved? Good. Now lower. Wait for a wave of protest to pass again. Any histrionics here? How many repetitions can consolidate equal movement left and right? How many times have I done this? I don’t mean today. I mean, ever. How many times have I done this ever? And how many of those were truly equal? Was I even listening? And now I am.

Slowly, slowly fall, slowly, slowly rise. Lighten fingertips on the balustrade. Soften on the left. Soften on the right. Repeat. Balance 50:50. Is that 50:50? Gentle attention, remember. Just listen. Oh, how interesting you are! This time sink down into a deep crouch, tiptoes still, back straight, arms resting on the balcony, settle into low fold and then rise, slowly, slowly. Oh, how extraordinary you are! The arms, lifted into first position, graceful arcs extend to second (oranges in your armpits, remember), feet continue strong, tiptoes, equal on both and gently sink to stand at the barre.

Such memories. When did I last do this? At that tender cusp of puppy fat to something new, bashful, beautiful, blushing under the frank appraisal, admiring and mystified, of Mrs Garrett, the ballet teacher, previously never knowingly pleased by me. Suddenly, a swan, and oh, I missed it! The tender flowering too terrifying to contemplate. Quick! Stuff in crisps and anything else you can think of. Pack it down into that dangerous hollow opening, push down, push down, until you suffocate all sense of pleasure or pride in this magnificently growing up body. Who are you to have captured attention that way? Long before anyone was ready to contemplate that you’d be a woman one day.

For a moment there I hung suspended in possibility, arms raised in graceful curves, body young and fit and suddenly, through all the clouds and rain, a beautiful girl. And that didn’t sit well at all. Ebony and Ivory. Exercising those muscles. Waiting for just this moment. For clouds to part, and golden radiance to shine through.

Just one glorious moment, before the closing of the shutters of shame and shyness. Paradise lost.