Anne Leigh Parrish

originally published in Feminine Collective

 

Agony—a gone knee

Can’t bend—no way to mend

This isn’t about aging—maybe about raging

What stops the crazy rhyme-time?

Unplug the clock

Blind its ruby face

Tear your eyes out if you must

Choke on dust

There I go again, too easy

This lilting rhythm and sound

Trapped by the jazzy sing-song of

My ragged synapse

I didn’t make the world, you did

I wanted to fit in, then to be let out

Like a pair of pants that no longer suits

Okay, I’ll stop

But you see where I’m going and what I mean

All this noise in my head, your fault

You made the world in which I briefly twirled

SORRY!

Actually—no

I’ll go on making nonsense from the scantest sense

I rewrite the rules

Trade in the jewels you gave me or promised to

I get to speak in my own way, in my own way

You want to right me?

Bite me