when i'm like this / jonah

my fingers stutter shattered sentences

when i'm like this. when i'm like this,

i'm shrink plastic and the world is an oven; or –

when i'm like this, i'm every unsatisfying

leaf that never crunched underfoot. i'm the spitting

shivering underdog who never made it out of the gate.

i'm pluto between the years 2006 and the end of the world.

when i'm like this, the world is like that,

meaning that the world is my childhood. the world

is the bloated feeling of a stomach full of lukewarm tap water.

the world is a surprise party wrapped up straitjacket-tight

and just a day too early.

when i'm like this, i'm always stepping on the cracks

in the pavement. the cracks, the world says, will open up

and swallow me into the belly of the beast.

June 2020