Locked In

Whisper it to me while no one is listening

tell me I am a fool

tell me I am not

tell me something that makes sense

and then prove it

Encroachment

“Let’s play a game,” Alturis said.

“Let’s,” Megan agreed.

“We’ll ask each other questions.”

“Great.”

“I’ll start,” Alturis told her, and leaned forward.  “So tell me, Megan Cooper.  What part of yourself would you most like to kill?”

Megan had the feeling he asked all of his victims this.  Even so, she answered honestly, “My memory.”

Alturis sat back in his chair.  “That would be too bad.  Because your memory is one of the only things in life you own.”

“I’ll sell it to you for cheap.”

“Fine.  Sell it to me.  Tell me why I would want it.”

“Because it might amuse you in between murders?”

“But surely I must have a sample first, correct?” Alturis said comfortably.  “For instance, when did you first realize you were in love with your neighbor?”

Megan shrugged.  “I never was.”

“Then why do you look longingly at his house?”

“Just remembering,” she answered.  “That’s all.”

Phantom

Where are you tonight?
I see you sitting on the low-backed sofa
only a cat could love
discussing Jung and astrology in
the same breath.
I see you you are so unknowable
I hate one person more and that is
myself.

To Bleed

suffering is noisy is deformed

it spits on the sidewalk in front of innocent

bystanders it makes no apologies

it wipes its nose on its sleeve it whines

for sympathy it licks the hands of the compassionate

it howls over a broken fingernail

everything reminds it that it exists everything

mocks its existence everything shouts it

is ugly it is a freak at a freak show it is

the rotting leftover shoved in the back of

the refrigerator it makes everything smell

as its final biting and weeping vengeance that

it exists at all

Survival

She has a memory.  One beautiful memory.  Carefully held in the palm of her hands, so that no one else might find it and steal it from her.  Of that one summer morning, while the others still slept.  The driveway pavement cool on her bare feet as she stepped into the shadow cast by the huge Mountain Ash, the sun burning golden at the edges.  No one must have this moment.  No one must know it exists.  This moment must live inside of her forever.

Joy, Unexpected

I woke up as a fairy in the empty restaurant next to the woods.  From the time I was a girl I'd longed to live in the dollhouse in the attic.  But not until I opened my eyes and found myself crouching in the furthest corner of the kitchen pantry did I know that my hopes and dreams beat inside of a tiny heart.

Empty

Where is                                  here I am        

gone home without you

when I would rocket from the world

out of an ocean so impossibly asleep                                     

is the rain your final call

because I am wondering what this was for

           

why you ever loved me

why you do not anymore

there is no witness here

only ghosts of words that nudged into breath

  

the shape of a fool      shivering and wet       

your blanket thrown over the bed one cold night too late

 my eyes, heavy with dreams 

but you—                  

very much awake

how I welcomed the chance to be wrong

to never ask why you had to leave

why you had to come at all

was it to drift away from this eroding shore

or was it

not wanting to be sorry

not wanting to be felt sorry for

  

one last secret for memory to keep

Now our half-truths ship out

under cover of a cloud-filled sky

the sun you once spoke of

never any friend of mine

                                   

can you feel it rain

can you?