Born woman. Go on.
It's farther than it seems,
but okay.

Credit card's been stolen.
Go on.

Above all, remember,
whenever you cry,
husbands roll their eyes,

and children worry.

Go on.

The father that was yours
gets killed by a lung disease.

He loved you, at least you think so.
Go on.

Drink, smoke, do drugs.

Go on.

Drag your crippled bones
to work. Hate your boss
behind her back. Smile

to her face. Go on.

Eat. Don't eat. Get fat.
Get skinny. Go on.

Time fragments.
Space fractures.
Lives intersect.
Wombs bloom

with new life. Go on.
Wait.

Hold on.

Break down these walls
I’ll fall this fall
and swallow what I have to swallow
to get where I am
I don’t know what I did
But I’m here but I’m here
so something had to happen

There’s ******* clogging where air used to flow
through my nose and a haze where my brain used to sit
and no matter how many people and **** I fill in my room
I still feel alone and so lonely

I just want to ride away on a pony
I just want to ride away on a jet
I just want to ride away on a tortoise
Because no matter how far I go I can’t get away from myself

If love can be withdrawn
It never was

My love for you is not a gift
    To you
      It is a gift
        To me

Will you never be the last to hear?
That I've hummed a quiet sonnet for some ages now
Heavier just as you wisp me by
And capturing every wondering glance but deep brown yours

It cannot be – though I never insisted it –
That my blood hasn't spilt where you walk
But I never meant to ***** your sole
I only wanted that you would reach the beach before me

I can’t help but feel that somebody knows,
Though I've taken my tongue disheartened captive,
For I've sung it to them a thousand times – you and everybody –
That it’s not my fault I love you

And that I hurt of missing you
Even before you've kicked off from shore

Freedom, my fickle friend,
How nice of you to come.
Shall I take your coat?
Or will you creep furtively in the corner like last time?

Why so shy, freedom?
Your reputation precedes you.
Your triumphs trumpeted universally,
You’ve an entourage of millions.

Ah,
Freedom has a secret.

Statuesque, god-like, beautiful.
I cut you open one night,
While you holidayed in Nod.
A cat in the night, I crept inside,
Looking to unlock my door.

Instead I seizured in nocturnal vision.

Your breath notstirred.
Your blood notran.
Your heart notbeated.

Shriveled demon,
There is no hiding under the scalpel.
Your mask is torn off.
You wolf in sheep’s clothing.
You rotten peach.

Come not when you are called,
For I know already too much self-contradiction.

The flowerlike
animal perfume
in the god’s curly
hair —

don’t assume
that like a flower
his attributes
are there to tempt

you or
direct the moth’s
hunger —
simply he is
the temple of himself,

hair and hide
a sacrifice of blood and flowers
on his altar

if any worshipper
kneel or not.

Don’t spread me ‘neath the old willow
Or, I prithee; not the garden old Rover
used and abused and nothing grows  
Neither bury me in the forest
or on a grave in the cemetery
And floating  me out to sea-
that’s not for me.

Take me to a mountain top
where snow is pillow soft,
leave the stark grey mark,
all my earthly worth
on that pure white earth
where I can feel eternity.

(C) Bebe Evans, All rights reserved

I finally released
all the tensions between tendons
like silent nuclear bombs
The only time
I could let go of the wheel
and renounce control
because I never wanted it anyway

I never screamed without hearing myself
but even if the sound had fled
to supposed other dimensions
no one would know
because the aftermath was devastating

I knew if I held my eyes shut
in that flash of desolation
I could have been somewhere else
and according to that twacked out philosopher
I would be

I’d be sleeping in the dark
bright as a 30-watt bulb
hesitantly lifting the blinds
waiting
for a black herring to glide
through scorching smoke
and grasp a lung with an iron grip
so I could inhale another stab of monoxide

The decrepit and the sacrificial juveniles
sit like stones
behind tarnished shadows
and I wonder how grandma can age alone
not missing the empty echo of orange juice
on good porcelain
never used for breakfast
until the tumor spread past his eye
but her eyes
still veil something
hollow

she says deeshes
just like she did before
when he was fighting
to find her
through chemicals
where syllables are
out of order

despite my best half-holiday smile
she still takes care of that
40 year old teenage aunt
still a victim
of a world that will never give her children a chance
but maybe it’s healthy
healthy
like orange juice
just before
chemo

I could still see
in the shadows behind of a vacant pupil
nothing
had changed

blind promises lead to
a bruise festering beneath
stifled utterances and apologies
prerequisites for templates
of things never meant
but nevertheless
permanent

charred ochre and Prussian blue
churn into an acrylic wound
cringing
mesmerizing
all the ways to gouge into silence
just to purge verses that sound like
Not next time, I swear
I guess this is what they meant by
abstract

I should’ve listened
when I heard from a backdrop
that perfection is silent
behind clouds of luminescent cataracts
gushing
scorning
what has yet to be illuminated

but all this talk of perfection
makes me want to burn at the stake
there must be something
to ruin or save
because sacreligion isn’t free