Because you cannot use borrowed breath,
and move lips of another
that are pasted on your face.*

These words swam through
my mind
behind my eyes
and never visited your mind
or saw green swamp irises.

My words wear shackles;
the chain attaches stubbornly
against a cloud of nothingness,
the cloak you wear and the plume that spreads
behind you, where I am--
trailing the ground, dirtying, muddying.
Decomposing.

How nimble the fingers that point at the WomanChild,
the creature who does not learn to grow
because she wants to keep living and borrowing time,
not breaths, not skin cells and DNA and memories
that do not erase without ripping up the cassette and the VCR.

My words were meant to meet yours and touch pinkies.
Your thoughts made your words and body and smile lines
Run, run as fast as you could
                     from a Monster, a Curse, a King.

I am the sword of tongue and the fist that crumbles
when a beetle passes by.

You are scared of me.