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Susan melts butter with her eyes
reveals the too-yellow of this world
Neighbors goop on a porcelain dish
hardens to stale refrigerator spread
Susan exposes the truth.
Susan rages
Susan is too sensitive
Absorbed in herself
(when no one else will give her water)
You know no one's going to love you
No one's going to give you health care
Susan folds brown paper grocery bags
then tears them up
distributes the glass-sharp shreds to the homeless
Susan doesn't watch the news
She bleeds it.
Susan's always angry
Susan blows things out of proportion
(decades of silence, one demand)
But Susan, it's all in your head
You're too sick to speak
Too selfish to listen
No one's going to notice that the mind is part of the body
Here's a streetcorner. Here's a taller, and yet a taller building for you to jump from. Here's your therapist, your pills. Here's the line to get food. Here's all you need to know about the moral majority. Here's what you never tell anyone, especially the government.
Here's nice poetry, and when you can look me in the eye. Here's a list of the patterns you you you need to work on. Oh, and here is the stress I am under, if you could hold it for me a sec., I'll be right back; I'd like to cut off my hands. And, well, now, how can I really do anything about the violence in your home or the violence in my church or the violence in the mental health agencies and law. I'll just make my corner of the world a little brighter, and forget that I've given you.
Oh, yes, here it is, the last nail to your coffin. Rest in peace.
REST in PEACE
Now don't you move a muscle
That means you have boundary issues And have I told you
enough yet, Susan,
You talk too much!
Your personality is in disorder.
Something is terribly wrong with you, Susan
Susan bows her head
nods as the tears fill her eyes
walks quietly down to her room
waiting for the world to molest her, again.
Susan, stop melting butter with your eyes.
copyright 2004
Amy
Upham |
