sometimes i get tired of this whole
charade.

this whole steaming pile of garble
and nonsense, festering and prodded
with sticks and mutilated
with understanding.

everyone wants to relate

to something.

and i mean, yeah, of course.
you want to be taken in and coddled,
given the treatment of one who truly feels
something universal, and yet, suffers despite.

but sometimes i'm not so sure
that everyone does
get it.

i myself stand dormant in the mirror
weaving hair between two fingers
until the casualty of curls force their spines
into ringlets, disengaged from the tamer mane that bore them.

or i stomp on the floor alone in the mudroom
until all the books on the little built-in shelf
begin to shake and i fancy myself a giant
in a humble parlor, set out to ruin and be ruined
by the luxury of things.

or i write one word a thousand times
in one place so that it stops being a word
and becomes a picture of a man in a fedora
with a turtle face, smoking a cigarette,
a wicked sort of smile.

and this is how i grieve.
and this is how i love.
and this is how i accomplish
and make sense.

somehow though
i sort of think that i
still get it.

01/15/2008

Posted on 01/15/2008
Copyright © 2024 Lauren Singer