Greensleeves' Lament

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Greensleeves' Lament

Kathleen Myers

Imagine a rosy bud of a girl gone as hairy
and stinking as a musk-ox . Imagine a girl with a voice
as sweet as lilacs and baby aspirin and there's no one
to talk to. Imagine a girl imagining her own future
and seeing absolutely nothing. Nothing.

This is the girl who was carrying my child.

Imagine a laughing raucous belch of a girl gone as lonely
as a cancer patient. Imagine a girl with a mind
like a search engine and there's nothing
to sift through. Imagine a girl imagining her own future
and seeing absolutely nothing. Nothing.

This is the girl who stole my baby from me.

Now when they tell this story
thieves have become heroes, and my face
has liquefied like the insides of a lava lamp.
In their story, there is nothing left of me but cinders. But
be reminded: promises were made, the tracks of my face
were carved by hot tears and I,
I have not gone anywhere. I am here.

How convenient it is for everyone
that my laboring sorrow pushed
the moon out into the sky.

How convenient it is for everyone
that I subdued myself enough
to prevent the world from imploding.

Why do people clap when building implode?
When witches are cast into the oven?
When another person's pain offers up a lesson and
makes a pretty story?

Imagine an invisible moon of a woman. Imagine a woman
with a Teflon womb and dried-out
cork of a heart. Imagine a woman with nothing left
to learn about sorrow but an eon to think on it.

I have not gone anywhere. I am here.
.




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