if a witness could be called, she would have seen me
lives ago, when i was young, and possible: where once i held
gentle and did not shake, now only the raw potentiality of having nothing
and having nothing left to lose.
i i am only bones and muscle, tough on the teeth, all sinew and no soul.
no heart or kindness or softness left in the cavity of my rib cage, no brain
or logic or conscience to keep the rage at bay.
only the framework of an identity, interlocking knobs that comprise motion and this
sandstone skeleton, bones beached inland by receding tides and bleached
by the late millennium sun. this is what age is: a sort of brittle vitality, the knowing
of your own mortal timeline and the fight backward, toward what
we think is love. self love. family love. social love: for when you were
thin, or stylish, or had good skin. i i earn none of these any more. i am too large
to be seen, too integral to be untangled from the rest. visible only in the way
i choke the light and life out of the ecosystem around me, visible only in my hunger
and easy destruction of others. i will never be pregnant, never fallow with hope. i birth only
the earth, and everything on it. leave me: i i am rank and raw with ferocity, sharpened
fangs eager to meet in your throat. i know the taste of blood, the feeling of it
slick down the skin and cold on the ground. i puddle myself at your feet, hungry
enough.
