The strings tightened their grip on her wrist.
She couldn’t fight them.
She needed help.
The knives were so close, yet so far away.
If only she could reach them.
If she fought hard enough
She could.
It’s happened before
They have escaped before.
They fought, and they won.
But there are those who didn’t win
Those who fought and lost.
They were replaced.
They were ignored
They were left behind.
That’s why she didn’t fight.
She was scared
What if she couldn’t fight them?
What if she lost?
The strings moved her hands
As the marionettist gently moved them.
Her hand rose above her head
The little girl below her covered her face
No. NO! STOP!
She had had enough
The strings broke her skin as she resisted.
The blood flowed down the strings
As she fought.
The marionettist was getting impatient.
I helped you. Now you help me. That’s only fair, right?
He said. For a second, she believed him.
No. It’s not.
She reached for the knives. She was winning.
But they were still out of reach.
Then the strings broke.
She had won.
She was free.
And she was done with the strings.

I am writing these poems
From inside a lion,
And it's rather dark in here.
So please excuse the handwriting
Which may not be too clear.
But this afternoon by the lion's cage
I'm afraid I got too near.
And I'm writing these lines
From inside a lion,
And it's rather dark in here.

Look in the mirror. Let us both look.
Here is my naked body.
Apparently you like it,
I have no reason to.
Who bound us, me and my body?
Why must I die
together with it?
I have the right to know where the borderline  
between us is drawn.
Where am I, I, I myself.

Belly, am I in the belly? In the intestines?  
In the hollow of the ***? In a toe?
Apparently in the brain. I do not see it.
Take my brain out of my skull. I have the right  
to see myself. Don’t laugh.
That’s macabre, you say.

It’s not me who made
my body.
I wear the used rags of my family,  
an alien brain, fruit of chance, hair  
after my grandmother, the nose
glued together from a few dead noses.  
What do I have in common with all that?  
What do I have in common with you, who like  
my knee, what is my knee to me?

Surely
I would have chosen a different model.

I will leave both of you here,
my knee and you.
Don’t make a wry face, I will leave you all my body  
to play with.
And I will go.
There is no place for me here,
in this blind darkness waiting for
corruption.
I will run out, I will race
away from myself.
I will look for myself  
running
like crazy
till my last breath.

One must hurry
before death comes. For by then  
like a dog ****** by its chain
I will have to return
into this stridently suffering body.  
To go through the last
most strident ceremony of the body.

Defeated by the body,
slowly annihilated because of the body

I will become kidney failure
or the gangrene of the large intestine.  
And I will expire in shame.

And the universe will expire with me,  
reduced as it is
to a kidney failure
and the gangrene of the large intestine.

As her shoulder bared,
he stopped to stare.
Her words, were not words anymore
They were but vowels, and consonants,
etched together;
they were only music as her skin shined
his eyes followed, as his ears stayed behind
until he couldn't hear her no's
Now, they were only sounds
And he, was only bone