Vulnerability

mixed-media and personification

Vulnerability waits patiently outside the shuttered fortress you’ve expertly constructed out of unuttered words, blank stares, and 50 lb. bags of isolation. You’re somewhat impressed when she makes it through the gates of “I’m fine, thank you” and “No, I don’t need anything,” but when she swims across the moat of Fuck-You-Very-Much-infested waters, your jaw drops. “Who the hell does she think she is?” you ask your pet rock. Before you know it, Vulnerability is sitting on the porch swing admiring the view. She can’t hear you yelling at her to go away due to the lead-lined sheetrock and spray foam insulation.

Your first mistake is to crack the door open an inch in an effort to swat her away with your long-handled broom. A ray of sunlight blinds you temporarily and like a shadow, Vulnerability slinks inside. She’s a mess which is no surprise. It’s to be expected of someone who walks with open arms into streams of cascading arrows. She’s used a few to hold her hair together in a loose bun. There are creases around her eyes where life lives. Her skin is mottled, a patchwork quilt of life’s residue: smooth glowing patches where Love struck, angry red welts from pricks of Shame, pinpoints of light where Joy pierced her ears, Grief-stained fingertips, freckles born of Beauty’s stinging blows, and translucent scars on knees scraped bloody tripping over Rejection’s outstretched foot.

Vulnerability’s sudden presence causes your skin to tingle and your brain explodes with memories of sound and color and taste. You watch helplessly as your brick-and-mortar mausoleum starts to shake and crumble. Shutters break apart and clatter to the floor, letting in a flood of light that washes you outside. “You can either sink or swim,” Vulnerability shouts across the gushing waves of electromagnetic radiation. You grab hold of the color purple and reach for a wavelength of green to steady yourself. There’s light in your eyes, your nose, your mouth, and ears. You can hardly breathe.

Once you are tossed back into Vulnerability’s river, you draw from the reservoirs of everything you once knew in order to survive. You ignore the inane ranting and raving of Fear who insists you get out of the light right now. You lean heavily on Trust to guide you through the rapids. You float without direction until you hit solid ground, where you walk again toward cascading arrows with open arms.