Neural Shock-Stitch

by Elizabeth Pinborough

Life is a visit with strangeness—
like the drive through at the Arby’s

in Bowling Green where they couldn’t 
take my mother’s order because 

their cash register was on fire—
like when three Union swimmers 

jumped into Lost River to test her 
depths, quicksilver undertow ferrying 

them invisibly away—like when I 
climbed into Mammoth Cave, 

marveling at yellowed stalactite teeth 
in the dripping mildewed jaw until 

a National Park employee cut all lights, 
erasing my body—emptying my eyes 

so I could not see my own hand 
held out, heart fibers lashing with 

lively panic—like the pack rat who marks 
days in Timpanogos Cave stealing pens 

from the grimy guestbook, his house 
emitting a most terrible stench—like 

soaring over LaVell Edwards Stadium 
at sunrise in a hot air balloon, my 

third-grade homage to Dorothy’s first 
failed return from Oz—like trying not 

to remember what happened when 
my brain sputtered in a calcium flood 

after skull met pillar—like I plan for grief 
to gobble February, and clear my calendar. 

::

Elizabeth Pinborough is the co-editor of Young Ravens Literary Review and a featured poet on Mapping Literary Utah. Her collection of poems and linocuts, The Brain’s Lectionary: Psalms and Observations (BCC Press, 2022), encapsulates her literary journey to reconstruct her memory, language abilities, and relationship with God following a traumatic brain injury. Her poems have appeared in Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, Psaltery & Lyre, and Exponent II.

Image: Diane Helentjaris

Image description: bright, multicolored hot air balloon seen from inside as it inflates.