i'll never be a poet

science kid

performing arts,
sew a heart on sleeve with steel wool
it rubbed against that girl you squeezed to your chest in
a too-fond hug, too long
when she came away her face was bleeding.
she was crying too,
tearstains glittering on her teeth and tongue
a new believer, a divine personal encounter
.

the next day i saw your
silver cross winking on her neck,
the glint of a knife on tofu
awfully looking a lot more like a dagger
guess it wasn't real silver, the way
the bloodstains of rust bloomed along its axes
she looked like she wanted it too,
to down a bottle of poison and lay down for a day
rust mottling over the white neck, the mouth, the eyes

-

one time you did your research
on adding rosewater to contact lens solution
your voluntary participant, she
gasped at the glisten of the blush-dyed water
at the end of the two-week study,
you concluded
it gave her pink eye !!!

the experiment was not a success
but that's okay
you can always try again