poem: lifeboat

i am tired of the body horrors of other people’s children, i would like
(pretty please) cotton-candy romance. an empty park at sunset with the geese
running backwards and the bench making crosses in my back. the way his hair
drips over his eyes, his shirt tight against his shoulders. all you internet
ghouls (i am among you): are you okay? do you really believe
in your own irony? and the bench making crosses in my back, he says
sometimes I am infected with a deep sort of sad, the Princess
Mononoke sad of watching the wild things strip away and the pulsing heart
of the earth falling flat. and our mythologies along with it. in most cultures, did you
know, there have been beauty & the beast legends. sometimes the man was a snake or
a bear. it was meant to provide women a way of making sense of arranged
marriage: see, he is just a man after all. the forest is blonde in the daylight, the red
moon coming and hanging low. you know the feminine rise/the geese screaming,
you pluck the blackness from his squelching heart. and the mice and forest rats run
backwards over the wolves, shrieking in terror, away from this brave
new world. I tell him, I would like many children — that will be
our small salvation.