A pair of poems (new).

i think i'd like to check myself out from the library
'cause i never return my books.
so, if i have a barcode and a beep and a due date,
i can return myself whenever i want, and
i can renew myself infinitely,
and if someone else wants to get a hold of me,
they can just recall me online, and poof,
i'll be delivered to their door,
or held at the circulation desk of their choosing.

but if i don't turn myself back in when
someone else recalls me,
i'll have to pay a fine--the cost of replacement.
and then where would i be?
i'd have to figure out
how much money i'm worth
to someone else
for the purpose of
redistributing the knowledge
i have to offer
forever,
or until my pages fall out and
my spine is broken
and i can't (be) rebound anymore.

and how much money could that possibly be?
more than i can afford, i'm sure.
and if i could afford to replace myself,
i could by a me of my own,
and i wouldn't need to check myself out from the library at all.
but i might want to anyway.

and, plus, at the library, they have perfect temperature control,
to keep mold from growing inside me
(i'm allergic to mold),
and if there's a new edition of me, they can replace the circulating me
with a fresh new introduction and cover,
at no cost to the me who borrows.

-+-

what if i'm a serial, with new issues every season,
and the skin i shed isn't dead at all,
but crumpled-up content for the cover art?
can i read my back issues? does Ulrich's index me?
i hope i show progression of thought.
and that i have good underwriting.
and cpoy-editng.

poem of the moment #4

I knew you
before we both knew ourselves.
before your wounds had healed,
when your blood, true and strong,
flowed from your veins just as
thickly as it now pumps to the surface of your skin.
we were both more honest then.
tossed dignity aside,
too overwhelmed by love and life and
hormones
to conceal our soft bellies (fat with mother's milk).

and yet still we hid
from
sneering peers
strangers' gropes
fathers' arms
from
loving ourselves.

Then, then, I knew you.
And loved you for reflecting me,
whom i could not.
and for, within, the You i saw.

Loved you for the moth, wet and curled, wrapped within the
delicate protection
of
concentrated resolve.

I see you've got a wing out now, and a leg or two.



Good.

Me too.

So I'll know You, too, when we both emerge,
triumphant in birth and ready
to flutter,
and
depart.

Poem of the moment #3

Folding laundry and suddenly
a small doesn't seem quite so.
a shirt filled out, no longer draped loose on
soft shoulders, thin ribs.
chinks in the armor i put up to pretend i'm the same,
that i could have been happy before,
that it's No Big Deal, i can Handle it;
my excessive artificing foiled by a skin of cotton
spilling volumes of what lies beneath.

poem of the moment #2

I should tell you that I love you more.
It's silly, this game of invisible strings.
Of course I love you! It's what I was made for,
how we operate.
How silly, alien, to be afraid of that,
our most obvious connection!
Silly. Shake my head and laugh in
admiration
of my own absurdity.
I love you. Of course.

Poem of the moment #1

By the way,
you
owe me six dollars.
Which I only remember
because
I was mad at you
because
I was mad at me
because
I was insecure
and
I was afraid you wouldn't love me.

Which you probably didn't.
But neither did I.
So keep the six.
I'll count it penance for sinning
against myself.