I want to be small because the dust ruffles never covered my shadows and my toes twinkled under a sinking mattress and my scent cried out
By Poetry8 months ago in Poets
I clean my own messes with isopropyl alcohol and smiles wiping teardrops off tiles because this house isn’t mine but the towel fibers know
I should’ve been another visitor at sunset because down here the grass smells like prison cells and pancakes taste
My biology professor asked us to identify where mold grows. I thought about the mold creeping up the sides of the toilet bowl where tonight I lower my head in a quest for catharsis,
Where have I gone? I am lost in this skin my limbs foreign like God to atheists. Mold has sprouted in all the bullet holes
a cocktail of repentance diuretics for the sin of too much sodium laxatives for the sin of too much food trazedone for the sin of being awake long enough to sin
I drag the weight of a 1,000 missed moments and empty lunch boxes of forgotten tear drops a river under my bed The dust ruffles are still wet, I think.
I’m running out of fruit cups and excuses digging into a pocket full of history for recycled lies refurbished, coated in an ancient paint color: “I’m back”
swollen ankles exude shame guilt the sins of my lips printed on my belly I bow my head a slave to frenzied callings of survival
I pray for the day when goosebumps and blue lips don’t remind me of winning anymore and innocent bruises don’t remind me of trophies
I want to make myself digestible for others to take dainty bites and not choke on the heavy weight of me I want to stop taking up so much space.
purple bruise on my left knee over the dents and folds of hours wasted chasing fireflies in the dead of winter escape the chokehold