I go to Ikea after being forced to confront my childhood sexual trauma over the phone with my mother.
the mug is grey.
it is short and round.
contemporary almost.
I have not used it.
it sits buried on a shelf in the kitchen
and I fear the day someone touches it
like it is going to suddenly explode.
I am here for a wardrobe.
a set of cabinets that will help
me arrange my life
organize myself and belongings
finally, be free of the clutter on my floor
my mother's voice echoing
through the empty showcases
"Why didn't you tell me? I specifically asked you if anything had happened."
you are the kettle to my black pot.
my body is slowly shaking apart
the silence of the word, "what?"
whispered into a cellphone
listening ears all around
a star collapsing into itself
a black hole forming
she has no right.
she has no right.
each step is heavy
act normal.
make a joke.
laugh. make eye contact.
there are marks on my skin that have been uncovered
can you see the flesh? the bones, the puss-filled maggots
can you smell it now?
put your hand in my side, and know the real me.
there is a future I will never get the chance to have
buried in the back of a bathroom shelf organizer
and the concept of a headboard.
and that's the worst part of it now
-the want.
I want
for the first time in over twenty years I want
and I hate the wounded animal living in my skin
it's so needy.
it is not kind.
nobody wants that.
nobody.
I am so far from okay
I am standing on top of it
in a different plane of existence
looking at it
but unable to touch it.
have you ever wanted to die?
I wonder what it's like
to not feel,
but I remind myself
I've been there before,
and if I dont stop bleeding soon
I will have to see a doctor.
and they will open me up
look at my clockwork insides
the schematic instructions
for what a human should be set up
beside me on the table
and they will say,
yes, this ones broken.
they will poke and prod
and listen with a stethoscope.
my clockwork rhythm out of tune
skipping a beat,
"I am fine" I will say
"I have always been like this"
and I don't know if that's the sad part
that I know what unfixable means
or that I got so used to it,
I just assumed that's what music sounded like.
How To Sleep:
buy the largest bottle of whiskey you can afford
don't drink it.
take it out of the cupboard
then rebury it behind the potting soil.
take your sleeping medication as prescribed
fight it all night long
wake up in a fog so thick that you can't see your hands on the wheel of your car
wake up at work half way through your shift
push back the pain
push back the suffering
just five more hours
just three more days.
stare at the images that try to form behind your eyelids
and be consciously aware that
something is not right
something is wrong
the room is spinning
and the colors are too bright for the pitch black of night
there's an animal dying outside your window
but you don't live in that house anymore
and the only animals outside your windows now
are those squirrels that the neighbors keep feeding.
stare at the clock
four minutes have passed
close your eyes.
take a deep breath.
sleep.
there's something dying out there.
anxiety:
It is a yellow colored thing
green bile harsh in glinting light
it howls like a dog missing its home.
paces like a ocean trapped in a bucket
sloshing from side to side
waves cresting and collapsing back into themselves -even as I sit still as stone.
It is the thrum of bees in my chest
a threat
the distant sound of silence before everything breaks loose
the hesitation before turning on a light in a dark room.
before the fungi learned
I remember reading about how ancient trees existed before fungi knew how to break them down.
Not that the fungi didn't exist
but that they did not know how.
That somehow they had not yet reached their potential as the true ferryman of the natural world.
That they did not realize the great beings they could fell
and reduce to dirt, to grow more giants.
That their part in the universe
was not something they were born into
but something they learned how to do.
I find comfort in this knowledge.
Knowing that I too, may yet grow into myself
and that my place in the universe is not set in stone.