Star Dust

Abstract

Star Dust Jason Schneiderman (bio) Keywords Jason Schneiderman, poetry, stars, birth, origins of life, mother, death We are stardust Billion-year-old carbon —Joni Mitchell Ok, fine, so we’re all made of stars, but being made of starsis like being descended from Noah or Adam—it’s no big dealif you truly believe it—and what good is it to me that our sweatis made of star dust, that the unsanitary hand dryers at my schoolare made of star dust in the star dust bathrooms that the nursingdepartment can’t use because it turns out the star dryersare just blowing the star feces on our star hands all over the place?What good is it to me that the train to work is a star trainor that my job is a star job, or that the star human star bodycontains nine to eleven star pints of star blood? When I wasstar seven I was star woken, star gently, in the early morning,because my star mother was losing her star blood. She collectedthe star blood in star cartons, which had held the star milkI drank on my star cereal, to make measurement of the bloodfor the star doctors at the star hospital where she and mystar father went to complete the miscarriage of her star fetus,while I went to the house of her star friend, quietly, sleepily,and I didn’t even miss a star day of star school. Oh stars.Will you listen when I tell you I remember this? Stars,it happened five times, because my star mother wanted more star-life.She wanted to be a mother more times than she succeeded,and she only stopped so she wouldn’t die, which was a relief,because I wanted her not to die, and I think it made my mothersad that I didn’t want to make more lives as much as she had,and I think that’s what she meant when she made me promiseover and over again that I wouldn’t ever hurt myself, even thoughI had never shown any inclination toward self-harm or suicide,and yet, she brought it up over and over as though she knewsomething I didn’t about myself, and even though I thought I knewsomething about her, and her blood, and the empty milk cartonswe kept on hand for the next time she had to keep track [End Page 191] of the blood she was losing, maybe I was wrong. Thirty years later,when all those fears of her bleeding to death seemed trappedin some amber of memory, she died because her star lungswere too wet to carry the star oxygen to her star blood.I’m so sorry, star mother. I’m so sorry star corpse. Be at peace,for now, in the star ground, as I carry forward this star life,so star wasted on star me, the life you star wanted to makeso star badly, this star life you star wanted enough to risk death for,and here I am with no star children of my own, waiting to star crawlinto the star earth, saying I’m sorry, so sorry, thank youfor this life, star mother, so sorry, so sorry, I just don’t want it,so sorry, so sorry, I just want it to be over, so sorry. [End Page 192] Jason Schneiderman jason schneiderman is the author of four books of poems, most recently Hold Me Tight (Red Hen). He edited the anthology Queer: A Reader for Writers (Oxford UP). His poems and essays have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies; he is a longstanding co-host of the podcast Painted Bride Quarterly Slush Pile. His awards include the Shestack Award and a Fulbright Fellowship. He is professor of English at the Borough of Manhattan Community College and teaches in the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College. Copyright © 2023 The Massachusetts Review, Inc