Albatross
In my kitchen you
picked up my favorite things, the floral patterned China
The gold-rimmed cups
The pieces of lace, you
put them in your pockets, and said
what treasures they were,
that my fastidiously styled cocoon was
extraordinary
And later
I found them, all angles and shards
where you had left them in the street
to be run down
by pairs of boots or animals or cars
And I cannot stop seeing myself through your eyes, now:
an albatross,
painted and preening.
I am pretty and redundant.
Like sea foam or sand castles,
ashamed, apologies rising in my throat like bile
for the rings that adorn my fingers
and the sequined dress
and my belief in magic and simple pleasures
The coffee
My collection of bird bones and trinkets
Myself
Everything about me is Wrong. Intolerable. Disastrous.
In my kitchen, you took all the good parts
while I searched the cupboards for more
to hand over
like offerings
like a child
like a caricature of the jokes people like you
tell themselves
in the dark
after the fires have burned out
and the doll babies have been stuffed with cayenne,
bathed in whiskey,
and run through with pins; all my stitches,
loosening
like this.
