Periphery

I am ill-suited for this; I am not of these times of these and the kind
of like two things I am not and then am not. Have I found my voice
this shadow that trails behind me that flickers in the lights of the bedroom
does it sleep – voice, do you sleep? You are so strange. What sleep

Can take me from this what symphony of form that deludes reality
is anything but this. I do not sleep. I tremble the sheets when I clatter to bed
when I fold my feet and tuck my knees: I have a chest full of warm blood and raw
bones crude form that bleaches under scrutiny so weak it is deserted dirt and when

Do you think the rains will come back do you think this drought will expire will I speak in perfect form again I have no voice. Ill-suited and raw as a perfectly skinned peach

Who will take the first bite and swallow down into the magnificent black hollow
where the rot occurs where the sinking of wastes is ordinary and extraordinary is relief
the weight I have dropped, how it hangs from my crooked limbs thin as thumbtacks
what skin here

I am tired but I do not sleep I am tired and not of these places I cannot be, what grandmother mother, do you have to say to me?