I sketch you in Vivid Tangerine,
my Crayola memory frantic to get you down
before you’re gone again.

My therapist and you are at odds.
Treating OCD, she says, is about
desensitizing,
taking the power from the thought,
but you, the thought, are—

It’s like the scab on my lower lip
that every day, I wake and say
today, I will leave it alone
today, it will start to close

and then when I’m alone I crack it open
because the peel is satisfying, sure
but so is the pain itself,
and that’s the part I didn’t tell my therapist.

I think if I keep you surreal,
neon,
I can keep you a little longer.