Cheri Hu’s Experience [she/her]

In the twenty-something years of living, I have collected enough memories to fill up the sea. I happened to get on a boat that was going to sail through these waters. Destination: Unknown. 

The water’s not all the same. Some parts you would wanna skinny dip in, and other parts you would swim away like a great white shark is chasing you. 

Sometimes I slip into the water, starting with my toes, my legs, my chest… The edges of my body melt into the cold water, and I am engulfed by the suit of my younger self. I float in the density of this suspended moment, like I am plugged in, listening to the playlist of songs from my teenage years. 

Sometimes the water moves like water in a washing machine - swishing, swirling, tumbling - and I look at it through the glass. Even with that distance, something inside me churns, somewhere. Removed from the whirlwind, I am not getting in there. 

And so many other times, I carve my hands into a scoop. I want to hold water. I want to gather the best, brightest waters around the boat. I want fresh water not salt water. I want to hold water. After a while, what do I find? Condoms, urine, sperm…blood and flesh. The water becomes thicker and murkier with…the other bodies I encounter on the boat. 

How do I move here? How do I breathe? How do I, be?

So I dance with whoever else on the boat. We tango - fingers interlocked, legs stretched as we sink to some depths of ourselves. We don’t always move synchronously, so we improvise. Many times, though, we get tangled - a fucking yarn of limbs wrestling - We fall, plunging, breaking the soft surface of the sea. The impact stings hard - I am slapped by gurgling bubbles of clear silence, or confusion.

And I climb, climb back up to the deck and lie down staring at the sky, soaked in the weight of former selves that lift me up to a place that is newly familiar... 

When the sun sets 

I look into the water 

I dip my crescent palms into the sea

Breaking the spots of reflection I see of myself

I hold -   

Watch the water seep

through my fingers

I raise my arms and feel them dripping down

Leaving a tender trail through my body