1)
I go to Salvation Army to buy things I don't need,
things no one ever needed and that's why they're there in the first place.
Sometimes they play decent songs and I'll bop along to the music
through rows of apple-printed teacher's vests and
century-old prom dresses and
suspenders too tiny or too huge for any normal-shaped person.
And these plants, are they plastic?
No, alive-ish, and dying, and so am I,
but aren't we all,
and I move on to the electric gadgets,
some working, some long dead,
first the large (why would I pay $700 for a moldy fridge when
i can get a fresh one and
a smile with more than two teeth in it
for less at Lowe's)
then the small (what the hell is this amalgamation,
hot-air hair curlers and jumper cables and a lamp had a baby?)
and then I see something I could maybe actually use,
a griddle, but it's dirty,
and the rest on this shelf,
the twin quesadilla makers and the George Foreman grill,
caked with greasy cheese residue, make me wonder
why people don't wash things before giving them away,
why people don't just use a fucking frying pan.
2)
love tumors in my brain,
and tomatoes in the garden,
grow slow and keep me sane--
but i hate them, beg your pardon.
up by veins and through by blood,
you creep slowly inside.
slice me open, organ flood;
inhibitions forced untied.
various kitchen utensils:
forks and spoons and knives,
force us to live in these stencils
leading our samehouseseperate lives.
set me free set me free set me free--
no, hold on tight, don't let me be me.
3)
you spoke like my never-had mother
you made me
want to write
want to write more
and look into eyes and
play with the dirt and
faint.
you made me feel.
made me want to wrap myself in
your metal skies and
taste your sweet silverglowing sweat
and dew
and damp
and bloom.
you made me.
4)
i'm not daughter
after four years of college, i know the difference between drunk and high
invaluable education
she and i aren't close
some letters to write
formal goodbyes
she said, "i didn't mean to ignore you."
5)
i can see the stars shifting west,
and you're here but i'm there and
we're everywhere but each other.
and my tablecloth shoes want to go back to the desert,
but the graves and the spaceships
and the half-done cigarettes and
i love you because.
6)
the what ifs are killing me
sinking their teeth into my
ams and ares and will be-s
and tearing the flesh off my is-s
they yesterday their way into my tomorrows
and they keep me from living today.
my heart used to beat, once.
what-next. what-next.
but it's slowed to a dull what-if.
7)
my thumbs have fallen off
but i am not worried.
when the first to go are the most important,
you do not bother yourself with the rest.
it will be easy when my mouth and
my knees and my eyebrows are gone.
easy when my everything follows suit
and finds somewhere easier to be.
8)
a room full of mirrors and i can't see myself.
air glows incandescent and i breathe neon.
a bullet could come through these walls,
any one of these walls.
i can't press this button.
bows and curtsies and i'm still alone.
my lungs are bleeding.
a bullet could shatter this glass.
i spin and i spin and i knock shit down and blow shit up and
sew my mouth open and
a bullet will come through these walls,
any one of these walls,
any one of these upsidedown days.
9)
there is a bird who sits on my shoulder
he pecks my eyes and my teeth
he won't go away
he has my face and he sits on my shoulder and
he won't go away
my neck is bare. my thoughts are glowing.
he won't go away
he am I and I are him and
I won't go away anymore
