survivor

we're all survivors here, she says casually
assuming a history i have not divulged
except, in the way i turn my eyes from the graphic moments
the way i clutch your hand tighter when they yell for me from across the street
and obviously, we can recognize each other, but i have never felt
like a survivor until this moment
sitting luxurious on her overstuffed couch, stomach full and warm
pontificating on theories of pain across the polished wood of her coffee table
jumping up now and then to refill my glass

but i have never felt like a survivor.
see, to me surviving means just hanging on
one day at a time seems bleak, and pointless
like a plane wreck with a body found, half frozen and waterlogged
attached to machines and pumped back to some semblance of life
and the news says one survivor
and what they don't say is that their life, though saved, is forever changed
stripped of their consciousness and the innocence they say we're all born with
i don't want to survive like that
each second a reminder of what i've been through
because i have been through it all, but i don't want to live day by day
merely surviving, packing meaning into labels
that describe only what i've seen, and never who i am.

at the hospital they teach us to say overdose instead of suicide
and to share our feelings and talk about what we call traumas or incidents
and it's my fourth day before i hear the word survivor
thrown in among the rest of the jargon we embrace as a filing system for emotions
that do not stay still under names
so i take my tea to the swing in the hospital courtyard
fresh air on my side of the locked door
and pollute the fading daffodils with memories altogether too vivid.
did i? i ask out loud, embracing my label of crazy
did i survive?

because she says survivor like at least we've gained wisdom
but sometimes, i don't want to be strong, or brave
sometimes i want to curl crying into your shoulder and just let go
sometimes i do not want to know that this world is usually tough, and harsh
but instead believe that once in a while the good will win
that the sun will always rise again in the morning
and it's funny how we tend to de-emphasize beauty
stow those sunrises away next to dancing without incentive
and singing because you can't hold it back
and i seem to remember laughing for no reason except the air felt good on my face
and i knew i was beautiful
i seem to remember an unaffected hug, no one searching for lust
in that dark corner of here we go again

so i join my memory back on that overstuffed couch,
draped with our collective histories
and i touch my face, my hair, arms wrapped around myself to ensure my solidity
and i say it's funny how we as a people feel the need to hurt each other
and then use it as an excuse for never being quite whole again
reveling in this label of broken, held together by the glue
of the names we take refuge in
and i think that maybe, we don't break that easy
but only bend until the pressure is such that we wish we would
although we have convinced ourselves of our own fragility
and i think that maybe i can reject that image of the plane going down
maybe
i can let my past go
instead of letting it determine my present.

i know you

i'm gonna buy you a spider, he says
a necklace like the one you're wearing, something nice
and i nod obediently, paste on the smile i keep folded in the pocket of my apron
for occasions such as these, because here
i am merely a piece of public service
and stomping big boots in the direction of his knowing grin
will not label me the hero that it would in the circles i tend to inhabit
so i simply smile, paid less than ever
to be reluctantly on display for men, and i do not want to know this
but his name is david.
and he comes in twice a day for breakfast and lunch
then disregards the menu to tell me my face is what brought him in here
comments every time on my piercings and tattoos, says
you've done yourself up pretty there.
it's an honor to be served by someone as pretty as you
and i have no choice but to thank him and walk away
more naked than any stage i've ever adorned
more vulnerable than topless and swaying to music i can't stand
dollar bills in my g-string about to hit the floor
and i say thank you because i can't say
i know you.
with your neatly trimmed mustache and pressed shirts
pants just a little too tight, the bulge of your gut betraying your delusions
of still thirty-something, i know you.
you have peered at my body in the strobelight
held up dollar bills for a closer examination
you are the one who always tells me i'm pretty i remind you of your sister
won't i please come a little closer? there's no reason to be shy.
and he laughs at my blush behind the counter
fully clothed a second ago now stripped bare by nothing more
than the unoriginal power of his imagination
this food was delicious, he says. and i'll see you again tomorrow.

the hideaway was a small time bar in a big time town
undercover wealth disguised as dirty truckers with stacks of twenty dollar bill incentives
and mike was the man who sat at the bar
and never glanced at the stage.
half the time, no one was watching, so i danced like i was alone
practicing curls and dips so intricate i couldn't have stopped
to grasp a dollar bill between sweating breasts even if one had been offered
and so mike waited until i left the stage and danced my way to the bar for a drink
to present me with the 99 cent stuffed spider.
i don't know your name, he said. and even if i did
it wouldn't be your real one.
but i love the way your tattoo dances in the blacklight
and flexes when you raise your arms, and so i got you this.
and i thanked him with genuine emotion
he grinned back, said
now come sit on my lap, girl. show daddy how happy he made you.

and girls like me, i think we bring out the worst in men
push the boundaries of their nice guy principles
until an ordinary man in an ordinary store winks,
somewhere between a balding ponytail and cinched tight slacks
because he had decided that he knows me.
knows by the way my fingers twist when i think no one's looking
the way i work like a dance, constantly off balance and i like it that way
never setting both feet on the ground at once and he knows
that underneath my loose t-shirt there are no straight lines
and that if he ever made eye contact, he would not see his own reflection.
and girls like me, we must bring out the worst in guys like him
because now he's gonna buy me a spider
some trinket to show that he noticed me
and i will feel obliged to be so grateful that i just might sit on his lap
and call it consensual because of my chosen profession
because of the tank top i chose to wear this morning
and both of our dreams tonight will still blame my smile
for bringing the worst out
in men.

plastic bag man

john wraps plastic bags around his arms and legs
to protect his skin from the sun, which he has heard
causes cancer
and john can't afford health insurance or a gravestone
and his children stopped talking to him
the fourth time he was arrested for shouting on the street
about the government and all the ways they're fucking us over
and to john, it's just common knowledge, but he shouts anyway
because we are an uncommonly blind society
he wraps plastic bags around his exposed skin to keep the devil out
around his head to keep the demons in
protect his thoughts from those who would use them less productively
he rides his bicycle day in and day out
warning people who know how to read through plastic
armaggedon is coming
armaggedon is coming
only plastic never breaks down and his message is unheard
just ratatat of his bicycle wheels on uneven pavement
and the muttering under his breath
try now
fuckers
let me see you try

see, we have learned to recognize crazy on the street
long before it's reduced to plastic bag limbs
or drunken rage without the influence of alcohol
and i don't know if his name is really john
but i know he's been arrested more times than hospitalized
and hospitalized so often he's too medicated to spell his own name
but he could spell you that moment between the day and night shift
when you can stand by the locked door and smell fresh air
even if it is filtered through medicinal carnage
and relentlessly good intentions
see, we think we know how to recognize crazy on the street
but if you saw me, walking like i had all the time in the world
wearing my future like a suit of armor
could you imagine me waking up screaming in the middle of the night
unable to name my fear, and thus tame it
finally grown up, learned no longer believing in nightmares
just makes them scarier
imagine me screaming because my heart just restarted after self induced silence
and i can't figure out if i'm angry or relieved,
see, we think we know how to recognize crazy
but every girl on the psych ward with me had the same diagnosis
even though i just lay there and cried
and shelly cut herself with plastic silverware
and mary tried to drink the shower to get high
and we were all taking the same medication and john,
he's wrapping plastic bags around every inch of exposed skin
to keep out our judgement like acid rain drying in layers on parking lot pavement
or unprotected flesh, the only danger we acknowledge
is that which threatens our sense of self importance
because the boogyman is wrapped in plastic
we're all reduced to ten years old and screaming in the middle of the night
to prove we still exist
eager to recognize crazy in anything that takes it
one step further
from ourselves.