I Wrote This Poem

I don’t want to write this poem.

I don’t want to write any poem.

I want to write this poem.

I want to write anything sweet or terrible.

To feel real, to lie down next to you,

To understand why the bitter tree grew

into a house I would like to burn.

I do not want to burn the house.

There are many boxes I need to carry to the mountain.

I must go to the mountain empty.

There can be no more boxes to carry.

I must set myself on fire.

I must drink from the river.

I want to write about the wood.

I do not want to enter the wood.

There must be a map I’ve hidden from myself.

I must have hidden it for a reason.

Do not talk to me.

Talk to me.

I hear there is a girl on a mountain with her hair on fire.

I hear there is a girl eating her arms and putting snails in her ears.

Shells in her bottom. Sticks in her stomach.

I had a friend who reminded me I am a woman.

I had a therapist who reminded me I’m a man.

There was a poem about a mountain.

And there was a poem about a field.

In the field there was a childhood

rolled out in red carpet with birds of burnt bone

This must have been the wood

I do not want to go.

On the carpet were my children

I will lay down beside you.

In my brain, a map. I have hidden

from myself, in your body.

Talk to me.

Do not talk to me.

You are my speaker.

Or I am listening.

Anger is a bad boat.

There will never be a drowning

You must drown.

There is a mountain

A girl on top who has a man

inside her, he is making sticks

into knives and calling off the hunt.

He is calling the hunters to him.

He is a king of sorts. In the field

of red carpet rolled into childhood.

I do not want to write this poem.

I want to write this poem.

She takes snails into her mouth

And the sun rises.

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