I. I FEAR BEING POINTLESS
i understand what you say without words,
i feel your energy,
i feel it flowing, animate, extending his
tendrils and writhing like roadkill.
you stand beside me. retching.
re-opening wounds in spite of the hands
that feed you because you just
don’t have enough teeth to bite with yet and
you comment on how this is kind of gross,
isn’t it? the way it oozes like that?
pulsing in my eardrums, i say no, this is
beautiful,
because i can hear what you’re saying
like a deaf barn dog hears dinner bells
II. I FEAR I WILL BE LEFT BEHIND
i feel dust caking, dry as soon as it hits the
sweat on my eyebrow. i try to imagine my
flesh growing under the weight of it,
melding together, increasing in mass.
ive felt heavier lately anyway,
i keep scratching my legs ‘cause theres
something in those veins in there, im telling
you, it breathes at night when it thinks
im asleep
III. I FEAR MIRRORS AND SCALES
i keep remembering things i shouldn’t,
i remember all the daycares ive filtered
through. i remember (her), and her gameboy
color and physiological tremor, speaking
to me through the fruit snacks she fed me.
i tried telling her how this felt.
i tried telling her how inhuman i was, how
something just didn’t feel right, is this
normal? is this part of growing up?
do you become an adult when you notice
what’s missing? no,
you become an adult when you realize you
are made to break apart, you become an
adult when you realize your joints are
perforated, you become an adult when
being fearless terrifies you.
(you collect phobias and arrange them on a platter, born from desperation, you feed into them and they respirate knowing you are absolutely nothing without them)