I'm afraid
We're going to isolate
Even further than we are

If we don't get a grip
On this sinking ship
Going down for the third

Being all I, me, mine
Where we spend our time
Inside our solitary rooms

This constant creep of self
Will soon be our death
If we keep humming this crazy tune

Our social butterfly
Has up and died
Cut off in mid-bloom

The once abundant life
Took to flight
With nothing much to do

But to isolate
I'm afraid
Even further than we are

With no flotation devices left
On this sinking ship
Going down for the third

waking
newly human
strange and soft;
pinpricks, feelings -
the crawlings around inside you
shiver as your skin becomes real

a nightlight for daytime sleeplessness
carry the seas inside yourself
like people:
walking barefoot
drinking sunstreams
and braving the dark red nights

hark, choir voices, still
slurring miss you discrepancies
howls in empty skies
wolves die

a misunderstanding of your insides
bones
more sand than rock
crumble at a press too hard

on this,
last day of your first life
hung on a boy’s fingers
the edge of a cliff
taste the water in your nerve endings dragging you home
you splinter,
and you rise -

when the bruise blooms, you shine

the curves on my
frame are the lines of
a sketch bent slightly
too far; i'm an awkward
angle in geometry
class no one dares to
find and this tiny black

dress is revealing too
much in too little
time. the whispers of
crisscrossed marked
thighs and starry knees
swirl before me and i'm

gone, disconnected. they say
black is slimming but
i've never felt more
potent and i hope
to god no one can see
right through me.

formal dances aren't
ideal for the invisible.

Engaged in quiet conversation,
I asked how you had been;
you looked truly marvelous,
so nice to see you once again.

How were the kids and hubby?
you showed a picture from your purse;
then said you were divorced,
but things could be much worse.

He gave you pain and alimony,
but not amenability;
on how to raise the children,
on that he'd disagreed.

But you had to leave or wither,
your fruit was dying on the vine;
and when you asked for peace,
he said he didn't have the time.

Is there something I could do I asked,
to smooth out this bad news?
you've already helped she said,
it was nice of you to schmooze.

Funny, how sometimes butterflies
skip over your skin without ever landing,
how basketballs spin
around the rim without swishing,
or how things never seem to work out.
I’ve been wishing

for moments of high tide, gravitational
moons that would draw me to you,
in the middle of May on Coney Island.
I want you to pull my pigtails like it’s preschool.
I want to bleed neon, shout pop tunes
to accompany my words that sound like
a poem we all had to learn
to recite from memory.

Funny, how we store meat behind our popsicles
in the freezer, how we tear up things
before we throw them away,
or how defeated we feel when we wake up
to zero new messages.
I’ve been reaching

for the plug in the drain,
sipping champagne,
hearing your name,

when all I really want is lunchboxes,
the kind your mom leaves notes in.
I want to beat you in four square,
color on my Converse, catch crayfish
in the creek behind your house.

Funny, how we tone down our souls
to fit the mold, or interview each other
based on pieces of paper when we are
alive, and breathing, and it’s funny
how we save money for next time,
plan for tomorrow before we’re done with today,
count our accomplishments before our scars.

Funny, how all we ever wanted
was to finally be exactly where we are.