cause your factions can’t agree

the flesh and the outside jumps to escape itself:

press paper to your skin, hope the ink rubs off 

graphite grains a freckled spatter:

they cover the hair on your forearms, dust your skin and

adults either say don’t draw on yourself or

oh, you must have been working

so hard at your writing

contraction in the back of your head

you shove the banalities forefront

and the hair that frames your face is illusory, fragile:

choppily cut in one sheer spill

your measure overflows

your rhyme is overwhelmed

you retreat:

the tension is gone from your head

like snakeskin and petals, your glamour wilts,

shudders, drops

and it’s the first to go cause

your factions all agree to vacate

so this is why you’re a hairless head on a stem

stare at the fingers clutch you like a chess piece,

roots writhing in giddy bright air

the theater is crowded tonight

the theater is empty tonight