Samantha Terrell & Julia Travers
Vagus Nerve Regeneration
When you tore my skin off, it was only an encasement.
Besides, it was
Too late.
I was already exposed,
Over-sensitive raw nerve-endings
Seeking shelter from years of hate;
Dependency, brushing
Too closely up to my
Naturally thick skin
Until, it had
Eventually been
Rubbed thin.
Your job was easy –
A vulture picking at
Fresh meat,
Leaving behind
Only a
Shell of me.
So it made
Sense to spare you
The blame –
Due, in part,
To the inevitable
Shame
Of allowing myself the torture
Of becoming an anorexic carcass;
But also since a vulture
Shouldn’t be denounced for
Simply fulfilling its
Nature.
They say nerves recover in
A manner of
About an inch
Per month, but
Regeneration depends on
Severity of the injury.
Inches and months become
Miles and years on the
Journey from heart to head. But none
Of it
Matters,
Once
The 1.1 mph neural message is, finally, received:
Healed.
Samantha Terrell, author of Vision, and Other Things We Hide From (Potter's Grove Press, 2021) is a widely published American poet whose work emphasizes self-awareness as a means to social awareness. Her poetry can be found in many fine publications, and has been featured on Sunny G Radio (Glasgow), the Dublin-based "Eat the Storms" podcast, "The Open Collaboration" all-acoustics show (Bristol, U.K.), and The Creative Drive podcast with J. Alejandro (U.S.A.). Samantha writes from her home in upstate New York where she lives with her husband and their two sons.
Julia Travers (she/her) is a writer, artist and teacher in Virginia, U.S.A. She grew up near the Chesapeake Bay and lives in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. She writes poetry, fiction, essays and news. Her creative works are published with Short Édition, Fish Publishing, Bowery Poetry, Rattapallax, On Being/ American Public Media, Ecological Citizen and others. She was recently awarded a Martha's Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing Poet-Author Fellowship. Find her work on her WEBSITE and on Twitter as @traversjul.