Behind her green sunglasses were two gray eyes
And behind her two gray eyes was her gray lumpy brain
In inside her gray lumpy brain were 86 billion neurons
And fired between those 86 billion neurons was one echoing electrical signal thought:

The mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell.

The shaft of moonlight stabs the
Soft skin between my *******.
I stare at the tips of my flesh
Imagine a babe suckling there.

You once told me you wished for children.
You once told me my hips and soft stomach foretold a healthy and long motherhood.
You once told me I already smelled of milk and sweet breath;
All I lacked was the baby powder.

You once told me.

You once told me the pink and purple of my *** was too mottled and unkempt.
You once told me the space between my eyes offset the masters degree I hung on my office's wall.

You once told me if I put as much time into my job as this family, I wouldn't be watching you shove your clothes into a worn and broken-toothed suitcase.

You used to lie there, between my *******,
The moisture of your breath evaporating off my skin and cooling my ******* to a point.
You'd laugh, press a kiss to each,
And tell me they must miss your tongue and teeth.

I scoot up the bed, sheets scratchy and sticking to my flushed skin.
The moonlight traces a path down my ribcage and navel,
A touchless touch that makes me ache for real fingers and real body heat.

I hear him, moving about the kitchen
Humming that Bob Seger song that tickled the back of my neck when I slid onto the back of his motorcycle,
Voices echoing in the half-empty parking lot.
I can see his hips swaying in the night sky
The slow ****** and long extended neck in the clouds.
I can smell his sweat and ***** on my body, the moist night breeze pushing him further into my lungs.

I press my face to the pillow
Inhale the detergent where you used to sweat pheromones, drool on, and bite when I kissed my way down between your thighs.

He starts to whistle, the *******.

He's tone deaf.

I press my lips flat, contain the laughter my body aches to set free.

You once told me that to be with a man was denying my true sexuality.
You once told me that if we were to marry, I'd never know a day without true joy.

I wonder what it felt like, love,
When he ****** you in our bed.
When he ate you on our sheets
Your *** on him his scent on you.

I wonder what it felt like, love,
To watch me fall apart.
To watch me scream and tear and bash my heart against the wall, the scent of your betrayal still hanging in the air between us.

I wonder what it felt like, love,
To deny your true sexuality.

I promised to love you forever.
I promised to care for you, in sickness and in health.
I promised to give you my all, and protect your heart with my life.
I promised.


He reaches the chorus one last time, and I feel my head begin to bounce
My toes tapping against the cool yellow paint of the wall.
The scent of bacon drifts beneath my door, overpowering his ***** and my sweat
And I roll out of bed, stomach grumbling.

I promised to love you forever, love.

When I **** him, I don't think of you.
When I **** him, he calls my name, not God's.
And when I **** him
I love it
And I don't miss your ***** for one ******* second.

Even his ******* bacon taste better than yours, you ****.

And when I tell him I love him, my lips against his naked shoulder,
My heart in my shaking hands,
He doesn't say that he's been ******* the mailman for the past three weeks.
And our married neighbor Kim.

He says "I love you, too."

And I believe him.

A boy with sloping shoulders that lies beneath the summer moon
His hair in feathered clumps and skin a pale green
The sugared breeze whispers between green-toothed skeletons
Whose crooked bodies loom, shadows dancing over his bare feet
Melted blues spill into oil and speckled white
An open canvass above to freckle his face with dew and starlight
His appled cheeks plump and rosy, his wet brown cow eyes and
Dancing hummingbird beat throb an echo across the woods
A rhythm that races between your xiphisternum and back bone.

When his laughter dances across the nape of your neck
When his breath coats your arms and tickles your brow
When his summer song flutters in and out of your hearing
Too soft and swift for your tree-root heart,
Then you must open your eyes and arms and embrace the heavens
Open your mouth and drink in the night air
In the hope his fleeting mirth might float by and trickle down your throat, might dust your heart in gold and green.

Slashes and cuts and bruises
You tell me I’m fine and I believe you
I press bandages to my skin and pretend.
Always pretending, always acting
Always saying I’m fine.

It began with a nudge, a slip,
A gentle flick to the ear.
"Dummy"

A tongue, a voice, a honeyed sound that
Slipped into my dreams and cradled my skull-
Until you dropped me suddenly, disappointed when I
Didn’t do as told.
"Ungrateful."

They came often then, thorns and glass in the corners of
My body, so that each time I moved I could not help but
Press them deeper into my skin.
"Lazy."
"Slow."
"Stupid."

The first punch was quick, almost painless
So that I lay in bed and ran my tongue over it,
A rotted tooth that spoiled and
Dripped sour down my throat.
"*****."

The first kick was sharp and jabbed
To the ribs, between the bones with steel-toed boots.
"******* ****."

The first cut was different
It stole blood, so that you put it to your mouth and tasted
Savored the iron and salt I made for you.
"*****."

When your fingers finally curled around my throat,
Something occurred to me.
Did it matter if I was so bruised and battered on the inside
If all anyone ever saw was the outside?
"Better off dead."
Did it matter if I bled or oozed or dripped with hurt
and hungered for love, if no one saw?
You didn’t like what you saw, you never did,
And you were the only one who saw the scars and
mutilated heart. So as long as no one saw,
No one would know. No one would ever know.
Not when my fear wasn’t enough
Not when my pain wasn’t enough
Not when everything I had to give and more wasn’t enough.
As long as no one knew how pathetic I was,
How ugly and scarred and utterly disgusting I was on the inside,
Then it didn’t matter.

I stole something today, something
small, clustered buzzing neon lights
bright and explosive pleasure cries,
the kind that sell for an hour
but remain bitter and chalky
when swallowed dry. I paid for it with

earl gray and soft sighs, melting
sunrises the colors of quiet,
maroon and hazel and sweet corners of dusk.
She cracked herself open, like an egg or a popsicklestick bird cage,
ended her reign of my kingdom and handed me
the dripping, palpitating mass of dreams
that once existed behind her shuttered curtains.

I pulled it to my sternum, steaming
red and grained muscle hot in my
shaking hand. She smiled, those
earl grays that soothed stabbed those
pillows that pressed smothered and those
apples that blossomed rotted beneath soured flesh. My head bowed,

my chin pressed to my chest so that I might’ve
gnawed through my backbone. I
opened my mouth and bit
into her heart, and chewed in time to the
echoing of her clicking heels.

Ironic.

Punched and lulled and soft
Swung, fat marcato
Something whispered, stolen
Each voice is a scent
Each color is a word
And the taste of ash permeates each touch

I smooth a hand over the ending
A coating of dust turns my skin gray
Fuzzy and soft, like downy or feathers
Or the soft lighting of a rainy day

I fluctuate, expand, reexamine and redesign
The scent was cold, now hot
And the only thing I remember
Is the orange essence that clung
To your fat, red tie.