Another Conditional
If something goes to the bone, it is thought to be deep; what is beneath bone? More meat, more gunk, more bodyodyody to get unforgiven, cantankerous, needing a seat with a back like for sure the sudden rain drenching the warm health I felt urging in my skin, pillows foam shields, looking for friends no longer there, being able to happen
Stop trying, even when you've gone dry. You know better than to collect my shards and cast them into something sphered, something sober
When I tell you I'm tired you make me wait like a dog
You think you want to take care of me but you don't. This doesn't make you bad the way that other things might: I get it, loving and resenting me, how I can suck the youth out of any room once you look at me with sad eyes over something fucking absurd that you knew was a joke I scorch everything with my teeth, my loud mouth a coal soaking rage, wrath, gutsquirm
Jesse Rice-Evans is a queer Southern poet based in NYC. Read her work forthcoming in Saltern, The Wanderer, Deaf Poets Society, HOLD, and others. Submit essays to her at Identity Theory: jessericeevans@identitytheory.com. She lives for opals, pit bulls, and pain meds.
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