as dripping beads
of egg-white
lying on the kitchen
quartz. My life's cut like

my jean shorts, ragged
and straggly.  I've wept
rivers. Like standing in
the cold rain I drain. So, now

I'm tapped. Someone ******
all the sap out of me, with their hands
like milking a tree. I'm dry as my father's
jokes. They didn't draw many laughs

from the blokes. I'm dry as
the Atacama. But drier still is
my drama. Dry as the chardonnay,
and the spill from yesterday.