Hannah Nathanson
New Year
I felt very uncommon, like I was a jerusalem cricket outside an apartment complex in Utah punching through dead leaves to scare myself. I heard my noise. It sounded like a much larger thing. A deer or moose or airplane. Airplanes are not like deer or moose or humans because they are more frequently struck by lightning and are therefore designed to account for that possibility. On airplanes, I can play trivia games. They ask about state capitals and don’t abbreviate to SLC. It’s impossible to play trivia on a moose. Especially if you’re a jerusalem cricket.
Basically, I felt very uncommon and as if I mispronounced myself. To be more specific, I felt as if I mispronounced the word ordinary. It was New Year’s Eve. Also, I think sometimes I forget my body. I have been known to leave the state without it. Remembering my arms, I hardly ever find them elbow-deep unsleeved in the dirt. Remembering my mouth, I hardly ever find a forgotten cigarette. I take these to be good signs.
New Year’s Eve comes each year, but always with just a few hours to grieve and celebrate everything that has ever happened. It is not an ordinary holiday. Uncommon things can happen.
Actually, New Year’s Eve is a day I sometimes remember my mouth around a cigarette. This year, a woman was looking at a punch bowl as if there was glitter in it. This was because there was glitter in it. She was dressed exceptionally normal. Instead of becoming the glitter, I decided to become the punch. Held by the bowl, different quantities of different things inside of me. It was appealing for obvious reasons. I enjoyed being looked at without her knowing she was looking at me.
A much larger thing: I wanted her there with me when I inevitably scared myself again with the punching through dead leaves. So, we had sex.
Another way airplanes are like sex: things taste differently than you might expect them to. Also, they both feel sad on New Year's Day. Some flights, I grieve the airplanes without screens. Nowadays, they even have screens flying out of St. George. After having sex, I tend to grieve what it was like to not have known about sex at all. Even if I had liked the normal woman, I still would have found myself wandering around the airport the next day feeling all sentimental about childhood.
Which reminds me of my body, which I have just now found standing in a puddle near the community garden back home in Bozeman. I find my hands in gardening gloves. Okay, I found it in bed, hands typing on my phone. Okay, back home in Queens. Okay, the laundromat now. Remembering my body, I hardly ever find it to be inside someone else’s. Even more rarely do I find it on an airplane. I have never, not even once, remembered my body and found out I was a jerusalem cricket.
I take this all to be a sign. I am overdue for a good year.
Basically, I felt very uncommon and as if I mispronounced myself. To be more specific, I felt as if I mispronounced the word ordinary. It was New Year’s Eve. Also, I think sometimes I forget my body. I have been known to leave the state without it. Remembering my arms, I hardly ever find them elbow-deep unsleeved in the dirt. Remembering my mouth, I hardly ever find a forgotten cigarette. I take these to be good signs.
New Year’s Eve comes each year, but always with just a few hours to grieve and celebrate everything that has ever happened. It is not an ordinary holiday. Uncommon things can happen.
Actually, New Year’s Eve is a day I sometimes remember my mouth around a cigarette. This year, a woman was looking at a punch bowl as if there was glitter in it. This was because there was glitter in it. She was dressed exceptionally normal. Instead of becoming the glitter, I decided to become the punch. Held by the bowl, different quantities of different things inside of me. It was appealing for obvious reasons. I enjoyed being looked at without her knowing she was looking at me.
A much larger thing: I wanted her there with me when I inevitably scared myself again with the punching through dead leaves. So, we had sex.
Another way airplanes are like sex: things taste differently than you might expect them to. Also, they both feel sad on New Year's Day. Some flights, I grieve the airplanes without screens. Nowadays, they even have screens flying out of St. George. After having sex, I tend to grieve what it was like to not have known about sex at all. Even if I had liked the normal woman, I still would have found myself wandering around the airport the next day feeling all sentimental about childhood.
Which reminds me of my body, which I have just now found standing in a puddle near the community garden back home in Bozeman. I find my hands in gardening gloves. Okay, I found it in bed, hands typing on my phone. Okay, back home in Queens. Okay, the laundromat now. Remembering my body, I hardly ever find it to be inside someone else’s. Even more rarely do I find it on an airplane. I have never, not even once, remembered my body and found out I was a jerusalem cricket.
I take this all to be a sign. I am overdue for a good year.
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Hannah Nathanson is an artist based in New York, New York, where she studies in Stony Brook's cross-genre MFA. Her work has previously been published by Academy of American Poets, Gone Lawn, and Rejection Letters, among elsewhere.
Hannah Nathanson is an artist based in New York, New York, where she studies in Stony Brook's cross-genre MFA. Her work has previously been published by Academy of American Poets, Gone Lawn, and Rejection Letters, among elsewhere.