Three Poems – Rebecca Kokitus

October 31, 2018

closet skeleton 

 

my spine feels wrong, like

someone dissected me 

in my sleep and took 

a single vertebra, souvenir 

 

if I gained the 20 lbs 

I starved away, a doctor 

could blame the pain 

on my body 

 

the truth is that my bones 

are hollowing themselves like

storm strewn trees 

but I look indestructible, 

 

the way a well-bred animal does—

watch me flay myself to prove 

my own biology,

 

to find the textbook skeleton

in the closet of my flesh 

 

 

bored 

 

when I tell people I’m bored they take it to heart 

but it’s nothing personal—I’ve been bored

my whole life 

 

why is it that I only feel real when I’m 

pushing 100 mph in my piece of shit ford 

on 20 mg of ritalin or 

breaking someone’s heart

 

real means overwhelmed 

means heat lightning on my eyelids 

when a hand strikes my cheek

 

night sky turns orange near the city 

like manmade aurora borealis 

stomach acid morning breath putrid 

I’m racing toward it always

I don’t know why

 

—I don’t want to be where 

I’m going, literally or 

figuratively

 

I’d imagine that would feel like

crawling into bed alone, still 

dizzy drunk 

 

wake up and the dry heaves

echo against porcelain skull

 

but I won’t be able to 

sick it up—the self I’d been before

 

that rancid sky sour girl, I 

miss her 

 

 

rose honey 

 

I bandage myself up, watch

the honeycomb bloat 

 

rose honey overflow, I 

read them like a palm reader

 

these are my lifelines, 

proof that I am alive

 

when he touches me, I 

miss being touchstarved

 

when he’s in me I’m a 

swordswallower, I bleed 

from the mouth down

 

searing like shearing, 

he shears me, sheepish

 

bald as a newborn, 

he likes me helpless