a buoyant oval shell, a structure
for control. I keep myself so zero
and clean, a neatly arranged red
scream. But every new morning
brings its own weight, a sinking
meat with no spaces for breath.
Whatever lightness was in me
is feeding a bird in a horizontal
cage, or breaking into pill-white
powder. I want to dissolve inside
a different body. I have shredded
the old body plan, made distance
between that gray panicked heat
and me. I am not now who I was,
but I have another use. I could be
a pattern for a soft metal circle
hidden inside bone, filled with
molten gold instead of air. I could
rest cold on the windowsill at night
or wash down the drain with red
and soap, let myself go boneless
until I touch the floor of the ocean.
I could sit there with the open dead
and watch the fish turn their bodies
into points of light tucked into sky.
