Every

I am so
angry
that I don't want to get dressed,
that I don't want to take a shower,
that I don't want to eat;
I'd rather sit on the couch and be
angry,
the ache on the sides of my head spreading
around and down to my neck, shoulders, back.

I want to scream at someone,
but my throat's not working;
I want to smash a window,
but that wouldn't help me escape.
I want to punch somebody,
but no matter how much force I put into the blow,
it lands too softly
to be felt.

That's the nightmare I have,
over and over--
I can't touch anyone; I can't feel anyone's skin.
I'm trying to hurt people,
but nothing I do reaches them.
And rage builds up inside my face,
and I can feel it shrieking, hear it slamming against my sinuses;
there's no room for more but it keeps
growing.

I can't go anywhere
or do
anything.

My Mother Wants to Know

My mother wants to know
why I don't have babies yet.
She wants to know
why I don't adopt them,
why I don't select one and bring it home.
My mother wants to know
why I can't be happy,
why I refuse to accept
that life just isn't going to be that great.

But it's not about reproduction;
it's not a matter of He won't sleep with me? No skin
off my back. Who wants to have sex
anyway? I'll just adopt a baby and that
will be all the love I need.
It's a matter of Right and Wrong, as in,
it's wrong to use your kids for that,
wrong to let them watch you live in miserable disappointment,
all the while telling them you want them to be happy
--Do as I say, not as I do--
wrong to to let them think it's normal for parents
not to love each other.

But--says my mother, confused--
people do that to their children all the time.

Uh, yeah. I know they do.

Wedding

He doesn't care about anything

and I don't care

about him

Zoe is a poet

Zoe is a poet
and she says she isn't
but the lines she pens between
SCREAMS OF CAPITALS
all dashed out breathless
like a child with news of the
stock market crashing, the hospital
falling down; and Mama's
too tall, too all, too forever,
between the
SCREAMS OF CAPITALS
are too full of beauty
for their unintentionality
to make them
meaningless.

Ball Gag

I just want to be in love with someone who comes to me and is like,
Listen.
There are like three hundred guys out there,
and I'm not gonna have time to commit seppuku,
can you hold them off for a bit?
and I can be like,
No problem, boss. I have GOT THIS.
and then we quote some Buddhist scripture at each other and
I write a tanka or something and head out there
to die fucking gloriously
before the compound goes up in flames.

I wanna be in love with someone who is like,
God dammit, woman, how many times have I told you
not to fucking LOOK at me after nightfall? and I can be like
Well how the fuck else was I going to find out
that you're not ACTUALLY a talking polar bear?
and I can harness the winds until I find
the troll palace and wash the tallow
from his shirt and bring him
back to my castle.

I want to love someone who says to me,
This is a beautiful rondeau--
but I, like Dian, cannot be pierced
by the golden arrows that arc out from Nox's unfathered egg.
and I will say to her, Lady,
here is where they have wounded me,
and maybe she will let me fetch her goblet
and maybe she will touch the top of my head with her fingertips;
maybe she will allow me to drink the wine of oblivion
and watch her dance, beneath the stairs
and past the forests of silver, gold, and diamond.

--and I don't want to be tied up or beaten anymore
or reminded that I'm worthless;
I don't need somebody to tell me when to eat
or what to wear or how
I feel right now--I know how I feel--
and it'd be nice to be given orders,
but only if I knew I wouldn't be asked
to sin against myself and even then
I wouldn't obey if by disobeying I could save my beloved
even a breath's worth of an inconvenience--

but what I do want, and what I think maybe
it's possible to have without also choking
on a ball gag--those things are so gross--
is a slap on the back and a Good job, soldier,
thanks to you I'm no longer
a goddamn talking polar bear, having no thumbs
made it kinda hard
to charm angry ghosts with my biwa,

so I can throw back my shoulders and be like,
No problem, boss. I have GOT THIS,
I have always got
your back.