The sun stalks me, reaching out for my pale limbs,

to advertise the empty marrow, the vestibules lanced

with exorcism, and I cuss to hide the spaces around my frame

with make up and laughter stirred by bourbon.

 

I raise my shoes as bloodhounds; pointed nozzles to a scented gallop,

and a heavy slave, I am, to the friendships scratching, my skin

strangles, an optic stock of nerve fluttering septic,

scoped in malnutrition,

to faint the fight.

 

 I am a cigarette;

a favour due for greedy hands.

 

Or a crossword penned with glue perhaps, glazing my furs

a white desert

but a menstruating tabloid when public incites;

 

ranting, parched, but too celestial

to park a venom of spit, simpering like a moth

swabbed with beauty magazines,

 

the wit froths on porcelain, the painted sniper

cleaning a path lined with razors

 

and wax strips,

 

splashing the tiles with blood red lips.