Poems on My Skin

I died the day I let them write

Their poetry on my flesh,
 with my own blood.

And when I told them they were wrong,

They looked at me like
I couldn’t understand my own skin,
and they said “How could we be?”

I let them write their heavy poetry

On my flesh with my own blood
And I died

I am a puppet, with its soul

Somewhere in the heavens,

Looking down at what it had
left behind, and thinking

“Well what a beautiful mess--
I let them steal its humanity."

I let them steal my humanity,

But I will get it back.

I don’t know how, but I will rise

Again.

See, I may not know how to write poetry,

And I don’t think I can,

But this is more than a poem—

No, this is a message to the Them:

I will write poetry on my own flesh,

And it will be in gold.

It will be my own gold.