It was hard to be wise....
You must eat change and endure
-Robinson Jeffers

Unzip this skin and see
your words impaled
on these tusks of heart:

curled myrtle wreathes hung
so pretty on a chamber door.
Look deeper - I am stuffed full

of your words, crushed up
like newspapers so they all fit,
the ink staining my fingers.

Unzip me and see them all
scattered like black poppy seeds,
like black ash on the wall

of the oven. You left them
all behind without asking,
left me too full of them.

I tried to tattoo over them,
I tried to ***** them out
with scotch (O how I tried

& tried and tried)
I tried to rake them away,
I held funerals for them

black wax candles, hex-moons,
but they never slept, and soon
they itched their way free.

Come get them -
you must be running out
of new things to say.