A POEM by CHLOE WHEELER
canonization
“and the archers shot at him 'til he was as full of arrows as an urchin (from Latin ‘hericius’ meaning hedgehog) is full of pricks, and thus left him there for dead.” — on the martyrdom of Saint Sebastianoops! i lost my silver hoop
earring, skinny dipping with a stranger,
in the Bay of Biscay last night,
when the moon was but a fingernail,
and the stars, scintillant croissant crumbs.
this morning my chest hurts, and
my heart is the hedgehog
that scampered—small, spiked,
and shivering—in front of
Francesco’s tiny car,
driving away
from the Comb of the Wind.
café para llevar. a pastry, and sand
in my toes. frog in my throat,
a tiny sparrow hovering an inch
from my espadrilles, eyeing
the crumbs i let cascade,
flirting with the prospect
of landing on my foot.
[fighting] the desire to never go home.
to stay, cast in stone, like the statue of Jesus,
El Sagrado Corazon, peering
poised, nonplussed
from his perch of permanence.
breathing bay breeze,
bearing the scalding sun
beating down on his weathered skin.
and isn’t it strange? that Francesco
arrived here, in Pais Vasco,
yesterday morning from Milan,
where St. Sebastian
himself, came to be
and was venerated (Psalm 118).
i light a cigarette, and write my number
on a shard of poetry torn from
the Louise Glück book i brought.
i don’t expect him to want to call me.
in a sense, he, like Sebastian,
allowed me to assail him
with sharp arrows,
my trite sorrows,
and sadness revealed
after six glasses of vino blanco.
in the end i don’t give him my number.
we pass in the hall of the hostel.
he is not my savior. he is just a man,
a hedgehog—small, spiked,
shivering—and I am not Irene of Rome.
with bleary eyes he invites me
to another beach
up the coast, close
to Saint-Jean-de-Luz,
but i decline.
instead i let San Sebastián
subsume me, drag me through
its cobbled streets, swaying into
its rhythms, its joviality.
i hum along, pretending to know the lyrics
to a song the street band is playing.
i, myself, cannot feign sainthood,
or purport myself to stand on
any moral high ground.
i haven’t the energy
or the grandiosity,
to scale those kinds of cliffs.
i am comfortable and confident at sea level.
the melody swells. i lose myself.
i am a face with no name.
nothing has ever happened to me.
“we’re not Spanish, we are Basque,”
a girl laughs, when i ask
her what we are celebrating.
i am pretending to know what life is about.
you get the melody in your ear and it’s easy.
just hum along until your voice gives.
Chloe Wheeler is a poet based in NYC. Her work has been published in Hobart Pulp, Expat Press, & Don't Submit, among others. You might be able to find her @idontreallyexistokay on IG & @sardine_enjoyer on X.