I can't write poetry anymore.
It's always too damned sad, always too damned real, and I can always say:
Yeah. It was a girl boy I knew. Too well.
I just wanted to help.
I fucked it up, just like mother, I fucked it up. And I wish I were better at comfort but the only thing I can do is cry with them. And analyze. And fuck it up. And spit my psychobabble. Vomit. As though the golden dome had fallen, from a Picasso window somewhere on campus, from my ulcers and let ipecac from the wells instead of blood and puss.
I can see it all from the bookstore. And as I'm re-shelving books, I find Po and realize I don't write poetry anymore. It's too damned sad and it's too damn real and it reads just like my mother's--she used to be a poet too.
And I wish I weren't so bad at comfort because I tried and she ended up with blackened lips that night when I couldn't think but to walk back upstairs. Cry and choke:
"It might be better. It might be better." Than living with her severe brow and thin lips and fucked head she put a dent in the Thermos with.
A lot of people say I take after my mother. And I might. I just might. I fucked it up, just like mother--I just want to comfort--
The tap on my shoulder, I'm holding Po.
"Excuse me?" man asks.
I swallow hard.
How can I help you?
