Things
I am better than them and not good enough for you
I have made boys love me
taken their insides out, put them back in wrong again and again.
I will not eat food in packages or with more than five ingredients
but I inhale cigarettes like air.
I practice yoga and
the light in me recognizes and honors the light in you when I fall down drunk.
My mother cut the veins along her arms
destroying them like enemies
while her blood still runs through them
I miss her when she’s around.
I took the bus for two hours alone in a state thousands of miles away
to get rid of another baby
and to stand
holding the hands of a man with a tiny Bible
who promised me because of Jesus everything would be OK.
I smoked meth and ate molly and dropped acid until
all the trees grew diamonds
and still I could not find beauty.
I am all of these things.
They multiply on the surface of my skin
and wait for me with mouths open
but they cannot have me yet.