my lungs collapse upon themselves
as I listen to you speak,
causing my chest to squeeze
and my ribs to break.

You’re all bones and no talk.
All dislocated ribs and shackled thoughts.
Contain them contain them, don’t you dare let them escape.
Hold on to what makes you broken, I’ve heard broken thoughts carry less weight.
So guard your bones that home your soul.
Sharpen your ribs and polish your throne.
Count the minutes and the hours and the seconds as they go.
You can’t expect royalty when you’re six feet below.

My ribs were the opening door for many to crawl into my skin
as they gently pushed, at the center of my body.
My ribs would give way as easily as wind chimes to the wind,
but when my ribs dinged against each other, there was no soft melody.
Except the scraping sounds of moving old furniture across wooden floors.

The groans of loves seats too tired to want to live somewhere new,
anxiety of having your counterpart, separated, and living across the room.
Those floating floors dipping to the cement.
Too worn from being walked all over without any care or repair.

The chimes do not stop at the door.
They bounce and echo off cliche yellow stained wall paper,
since the body is not a relict of the 70's but a newer model from the 90's.

When these people sneak on in they want to have a grand tour
wanting to be shown the history,
that lay within the amber bricks edging themselves around the fireplace.
All I can really tell them is that I will show them to their room.

That was only the beginning as they trouble me more and more
asking about every door that we pass, that's boarded up with rusty nails,
briskly I open their door and tell them to feel at home.

I warn them that the power is not so great here,
some times, often, always,  it will shut down.
We don't know how long it will take to get back as it's always different.
They tell me, they do not mind all these flaws, as they add character.

I nod and leave them to rearrange their new place to stay.
Eventually this room will share in only being used for the acoustics.
As well as another door I will need to glance pass,
when the next passerby comes to stay.

I have an old farmhouse inside my chest,
wooden siding rotten in places and windows
fractured from too many winters,
the roof of which sags near the chimney--
faint smoke-clouds rising, and a light
glowing yellow inside the kitchen, a beckoning

invitation into the faded blue walls
full with portraits of four--my mother, father,
and little sister--brassy frames hung close
together above the wooden table,
nicks and scratches connecting each placemat
like dots of the coloring book page left
magnet-stuck to the refrigerator.

The countertops have grown dusty.
fruit-bowl collecting gnats and mold,
but the zinnias over the sink flourish, replaced
daily and blooming red as the teakettle
rusting on the only remaining stove-top burner,
the others broken, tossed into the garbage
beside the back door, which leads to a forest--

rib-like oaks bent and bowed
over the farmhouse, ivy vines coiled ‘round
each trunk, stretching limb to limb, weaving
webs tangled as the unruly branches from which
they hang, caressing the slumped rooftop
as if to remind the battered, tired building how,
despite everything, the hearth still smolders.

I'm over stuffed;
my bones press with protest
against my skin,
as my ribs bend with worry
and my lungs fill in.

*I'm drowning.