As children,
we’re not allowed to speak.
Now, I’ll try anything to blow my candles out.
Maybe I’ll find myself walking on a placid street
meeting a stranger named Alice or Alicia
with a backpack, not a purse,
and no interest in remaining friendly
as we share a meal like orangutans.
I don’t know how the world began.
I’m sorry I missed your call;
please leave your message in a bottle
contributing to the North Pacific gyre,
or find some other way to ruin my day.
I’ll do anything to make your pigments fade.
My bedroom is haunted with the
memory of Mother Dearest;
red-haired Irish blood
impure from the cancer cells
I gave her.
I don’t know how it changes.
And as animals,
we’re not meant to.
I’ll be anything to make you not know me.
