poem: twisted

published also in one hand clapping magazine, in altered form

if you put my face into wet cement
it would not leave
defining marks.

my shoes squeak lolita lolita lolita
after i visit my father;
walking across town makes town
into thin manga lines,
the people slipping into hot
pencil shapes and his thumbprints
keeping close watch
on my ankles, on the young parts
of my thighs.

my father tells me: do not
think so much.

at night, we pause:
there is wet space in our mouths
with room for the world.
i think:
I am like nihilism, defining myself
by what i am not.