The Body
Eric says all my dreams are in my body
All my bad dreams
About betrayal
I don’t want to be in this body anymore
That holds all the betrayal of the universe
Its tissues bluing all day into blue-black
Blood balloon
One day all that blood will be dark and grey
I want to be an unearthly body instead of this one
I want to be a body that is free of dreams
The imagination
I never wanted the imagination within my legs and arms anyway
Blacking within it like forgotten light
Umbrella limbs full of potential light
I never wanted to be the person who tells you
That I believe in you
So that you never had to listen to anyone else
I never wanted
You to forget about me
Freeze me into arctic lust
Until I am never the body
That is amber in the sun
The people, I never wanted the people
To touch my body like they owned it
In dreams
On earth
In real life
I wanted people to believe in my body for once
Not my dreams
That you can walk through in wonderment
Because they are so beautiful
The whole world, the people
They never believed in my body
They only ever believed in their own bodies
Walking and talking
Through the world
Mimetic knights
The people
They only ever believed in their own similar bodies
Flattened pieces of videotape
Matted pictures, red and black
And twinned
The twinned heads and feet
The pickled noses, the twins
The people
Lost and adorned
They only ever believed in the things that were similar
They only ever believed in the cold
If only you liked me
I say anything to you
Things I wouldn’t say to everyone
I lie to you
But it is only to tell you the truth
I say
I have always wanted to be a star
And I have
Always wanted to be anything
That was well-respected
O
Sweetness in the grass
You black bird
That spits out blue
If only you loved me
The way dogs love me
You would nestle
Your curly head against me
We would sleep so soundly
Under the moon
I can’t be anything
But the thing
That I have shown you
When we were kissing
Under the moon
I was a sweet lady
That lessened in your grasp
You were strong
Like a blade of something
I would be anything
That you love
I would wear anything
No matter how much it hurt
I would change my voice
My heart
I would take off my face
I would replace my hands
With the kind of hands you like
I would cut down every piece
That disgusts you
And put it in the trash bin
To be thrown out in the morning
If only you promised
I was your tiny baby
That you held in your dress shirt
While you went to work
I wouldn’t make much noise
I would write everything I thought
Down on a small pad
To be given to you
At the end of the day
While you walked home
And when we would get back to your place
You could tenderly put me on the dresser
And I would swell to normal size
Like a fallen star swells with fire
Just before it explodes into the sun
You are a man
But you are no man
Who understands me
I understand you
But you don’t really notice
You’re the kind of person
That only notices things
Not worth noticing
I find that very attractive
That you are so dumb
Insensitive
Boorish even
You are like a big cow
That I put my face against
And your hide is soft
And strong
Brown
And rough
You bellow
And it sounds heavenly
I give you grass
Only cause you can’t get it for yourself
Then you let me on top of you
And tell me you’ll take me someplace
That you used to know and go to
And then when get there
I realize that I am the man
And you’re the animal
And you never know it
And so that is my little gift.
What is gone from American Poetry today is a thing called a soul
When you look over my shoulder
I don’t want you to look
White, fluffy men that hunt around
For the benefits of education
Do not understand what it is that needs to be learned
When somebody makes a Harry Potter joke
About how people read those books and buy them, big sales
Everybody laughs
I laugh too when I think of that office on the hill
Do you know how hard it is to be a genius?
Tire man and rolling flesh of white
And he walked purposely, with public purpose
With public good, I walked too
I brought to you the things you were missing
I lost the baby
I lost your baby
But it is not your baby I am talking about now
I am talking about
My baby, the little me
I lost the baby that was a good day
On that fine day when I lost the baby
I was no longer one
Oh, I haven’t slept I could say no longer
Oh, when I hadn’t eaten I couldn’t talk about that anymore
|