To tell you the truth,I want to be just like them.
To have a talent, and a perfect em
I don't have to be a star, I just want to fit in.
I'm the f on the test, do have to say it again?

I messed it up, killed vitamin m
I'm a splintered piece, a shattered gem
I made you cry, I'm an onion stem
I'm the worst at my best, should I say it again?

Sing my anthem, sing along.
I promise you, you won't be wronged
So sing my anthem, and come along,
Failure my theme song

Oh...
Failure, failure, failure my theme song
Failure, failure, failure my theme song
Failure, failure, failure my theme song
Failure my theme song

Look a me, I'm not pretend
In a visual world, worth depends
I'm a mirror to the world, this is the end
I'm the lowest of all, slap me again!

I fight my past, will I ever win?
Infinite quest, where is my twin
I'm losing the fight, farewell my friend
I'm losing control, all I see are fiends
I'm failing again, ill never win

Sing my anthem, sing along.
I promise you, you won't be wronged
So sing my anthem, and come along,
Failure my theme song
Keep on going, the battle's prolonged
Ring the bells, ding **** ding ****
Fly a kite, the string so long
Who choked the worst, I'll do them wrong!
Failure my theme song
Oh Failure my theme song

Failure, failure, failure my theme song
Failure, failure, failure my theme song
Failure, failure, failure my theme song
Failure my theme song

Worthless, useless, ignorant, freak,
Just accept it, this is me
Stupid, idiot, nerdy geek
I've always wondered my destiny
I'm a failure, don't you see?
You sang my anthem, you sang along (you sang my song)
I promised you, you wouldn't be wronged
So you sang my anthem, and came along
Failure our theme song...

Sing my anthem, sing along.
I promise you, you won't be wronged
So sing my anthem, and come along,
Failure my theme song
Keep on going, the battle's prolonged
Ring the bells, ding **** ding ****
Fly a kite, the string so long
They choked the worst, I did them wrong!
Failure my theme song
Imprisonment, we'll be amongst
Dancing free, chained sarong
I know my place, tempted strong
I'm Zelkova, not a currajong
Failure my theme song
Oh failure our theme song

Failure, failure, failure my theme song
Failure, failure, failure my theme song
Failure, failure, failure my theme song
Failure my theme song
Oh failure my theme song

His *****-white sneakers tied in double knots
three strides down the sidewalk and he knows they are too small
He didn’t know that your feet could get fatter too but
oh that’s right
Emily’s feet had grown with each pregnancy
People tell him that’s a lot of kids
Four - no ****
He was on the track team in high school but he’s the wrong size now
Right size?
It’s women on billboards
oiled like seals
lips puckered to meet the side of a ***** bottle
in this city and every city in America
Emily had managed to stay fit and what a miracle that was
She is one of those women
who looks good - healthy
in her element even
with a runny-nosed child on her hip
and three hours of sleep
and no makeup
and snot smeared on the shoulder of her black tshirt
Flower of a woman
People ask him how does she do it?
By his male friends he’s told how lucky he is
but that wasn’t the word he was thinking of

He is working up a sweat now
He feels each foot land on the pavement with his whole body
He watches small dogs lift their legs, demurely
They relieve themselves on statues on the Comm Ave Mall
He feels like the figment of someone else’s imagination
He sees trees he could identify when he was a botany major
before he traded his VW for a minivan
Sweetgum, green ash, maple, linden, zelkova, Japanese pagoda
that one’s an elm
even his six-year-old knows what an elm is
New synapses formed
Genus and species replaced by numbers, meaningless
They only mean something if his client is getting paid
One day a paycheck, a bottle of champagne
Another
stress, Netflix for entertainment
He’s left his iphone on the kitchen counter
No missed calls or new text messages
No music on this run
Unfiltered thoughts where Led Zeppelin should be
He remembers next week is Lulu’s birthday
Peaches and cream little girl
who is never seen without bruises on her knobby bird’s legs
Kat, older, malleable, chose ballet
Lulu insists on football
She wants to get ***** and tackle boys
The first day of practice he was mildly horrified
when he realized she is the only female in the league
He loves watching the other teams’ faces when they learn they just played a girl
because it is impossible to tell under all the padding
until Lulu pulls off her helmet at the end of the game
slow motion
as she walks off the field
shaking out honey-colored hair
throwing a wink at her rivals
Players use last names only by some unspoken rule
But not her
she is still his Lulu
her closet filled with princess dresses and football jerseys

Who knew spring could
bring such surprises—

sparrows excavating beak-by-beak
a grapefruit-sized hole in the crabapple
that grows between two 3-family
houses on Franklin Street,

the last jab of a miracle
serum that so many others are
dying to get, and others who
have died waiting for.

And I—after living five years under
ground—feasting on the view of tiny,
chartreuse leaves on the zelkova
tree across the street;

starlings, house sparrows, blue
jays, robins, and mourning doves
strafing past my 2nd floor window
on their flight paths back and forth.

Who knew those five years of
basement dwelling so molded me,

shaped me like a recluse, a contented
she-bear sleeping 10 hours a day,
never knowing what the weather was
doing, what visions I was missing?

Like the surprise snow on April 16
dusting, then completely covering the purple
and yellow pansies I’d so uncharacteristically
planted in window boxes the week before.

Who knew I’d ever be cloaked again
in this shawl of optimism, this “blithe spirit”
that comes from living with the living,
seeing the seen, being the being?