it is hard to describe quite
the feeling I feel when I see
what I see what I see when
I tiptoe to the waters edge -

bare quiet witness to the highly mannered,
manifold expressions of life that
grace this place - some things so
light and bright and
weird and delicate
as to stupefy
the senses -

language often
founders in
such
seas.

better to picture it in your head if you wish to
feel it.

that anyone could make me feel naked in
suspense, a need to curl my fingers? I'll remind myself
that I need my bed rest, that I need
the thing that heals, that I need
anything at all is too much, it's too
tedious to need, I won't admit to
it, most of the time I won't.

groaning grows from the throat,  trickling down,
my voice isn't sweet like honey,
but more harsh harsh harsh in ways like
dry swallowing big pill after pill after pill.

the ends of my fingers are beams, they are brightest
when I touch the space between me and
the space between you and the soft space
left after drinking what we
bottle
up,

every time
every time.

My hands look old.
I don't know what happened to their previous beings,
their soft, pale, younger selves.
My hands are cracked from the dry humorless days of anticipation.
I have hangnails, my skin so dry it's splitting from itself.
And they shake.
They shake along with my voice and my thoughts.
Trembling with excitement and worry.
When you're in the room,
especially when you're not, though.

I have stretch marks.
On my inner thighs, and on my sides,
they remind me of roads, of maps, of going places.
Each goosebump is a hillside,
each little crack in my dry skin is a riverbed, waiting for rain.
My body is a terrain of  imperfections,
and I'm just trying to keep still enough
as to not disturb the world that I harvest.

I'm standing (just so)
the way you're sitting (just so)
just so, just so
you'll see my
hunched
back, see my
poor mouth that is
twisted (just so)
with cracked lips and

for you
I won't fake composure when
I haven't any.

make eyes, little girl, make
eyes
at me.

make them stars so I may not
lose them in the over-bearing light
of day at times and
make them burn like
third-degree burns so I'll
never forget the feeling of them
on my skin.

make them that sweet poetry you speak so that
my palpitating heart can know what it's like to
stop mid-sentence and


(quietly, now)

make eyes, little girl, make
eyes
at
me.

the air isn't pinching, it nibbles my skin as I catch the scent of
remorse and a hint of peanutbutter and honey,
tangy and sweet I wish I weren't that way sometimes,
I wish I could see the worm in an apple instead of
the seeds

a nefarious dead-pan glance and
all I can think about is how I have
your favorite book tucked away, safe,
because I want an excuse for my
trembling hands and the constant
chugging of my mind at times, the ever-
present headache that originates in
my stomach. I am hosting a
cavernous black hole there
that spreads it's lips
wider and
wider
and

w   i     d             e             r

every day that washes over,
leaving me a little paler a little thinner a
little hungrier than
before

I am s
        i
     n
   k
  i
n
g