that's mrs. mediocrity to you

I couldn’t sleep for weeks
and then I remembered that I needed to write.

Ariel was always a dream, but a wakeful one,
whispering pictures and posturing portent.

I don’t need to sing, my body
is always happy to do that for me.

There’s a fire burning inside me (literally)
at the same time there’s a fire
burning down the world.

I lay awake at night and rage at everything,
but in a peaceful way.

I eat grace for breakfast and anomaly for lunch.

Everything has too many calories.
Something else I have to burn.

I can only sleep when my feet are cool
and mine are scorching these sheets
like my mother’s old iron.

This room is never dark enough,
and I am never really here.

It doesn’t matter.

Matter is energy and I am combustible.
I float like a gas just south of the ceiling.

No one ever notices, which is funny.
Except when I get stuck in cobwebs.

I’ve lived in this house longer than I haven’t.
It’s small and tiny and we are always tripping over each other.

I trip over everything anyway.

It’s winter and I miss the sky.

The snow geese are down at the swamp screaming injustice.

On New Year’s Eve the fireworks gave them fits
and I smiled as I stood
alone in the center of road
as white sparks drifted down
like lost feathers.

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