18. it’s that time of year when
i don’t want to wear
my skin
and melancholy sags over me
like winter’s salty old coat
i am filled with
inchoate grief
with the angry toddler
whose father never came home
and the specter of
impending departures
including eventually
my own
so what if the cedar and maple
shiver with sexy delight
and slutty daffodil triumph
again
over frozen soil
so what if promiscuous squirrels
tangle across our
juiced up lawns
slick with golden dawn
i am a ghost
dreaming of ghosts
a dying woman already
haunting her body
