UNTITLED II

Sometimes,
even when the story is my own,
I don’t know where it began.

Perhaps with a fly’s
incessant buzz around my head
or back to that time
you told me I didn’t matter anymore.

It could have started strong,
and eventually petered out
like an inexperienced runner.
Or the inverse could be true —
the beginning was a weak thing,
the neck of a newborn,
that evolved into a Led Zeppelin
guitar lick.

I often sit and wonder
where and why it ever started at all.
How my perfect visage
eventually cramped
and broke into all these shards —
a broom isn’t determined enough
to sweep them up completely.

People will talk.
They will say,
“She always was small.
She always looked tepid.”
I will lick my fingers,
and ask for a third helping.

Life.

Keep dishing it out,
and like the court’s fool,
I keep taking it.

COMPANIONSHIP

I.
This pile of dread builds
like macular degeneration
or my husband’s snore.

II.
These knives
cannot even cut strings,
little lone the shards of yesterday’s defeat.

III.
“May I speak frankly
for a moment,”
said the professor to his students.

Their thoughts trailed off
as their faint heads bobbed
in the rhythmic motion of “yes.”

IV.
I have this heap
of blue and yellow fabrics
but no idea how to quilt them together.

V.
When I turned to the shadow,
Fear was there, smiling.
A toothy, pleased-with-himself grin.

The train runs every 40 minutes,
but it’s 2,000 miles away.
My only escape.

LIKE CLOCKWORK

My mind
is a riot,
never quiet.
With wheels
that turn,
spin and burn.

I have this silhouette —
a shadow of myself
I carry around
in my pocket.
The other half
of a best friend locket.

Somewhere along the path,
self pity and disdain
gave way to blissful organization,
and a release of pent up pain.

No more crying in the closet!
No more aimless shame!
Only the realness of what is real,
And a shoulder for the blame.