rage fragment

I’ve started using Grindr again

for the first time in years. I used to call myself

an addict and went to meetings but not for sex.

For the feeling of falling into a body, not caring

//

about them as much as they do about me. I’m

an asshole. I’m only attracted to people if they’re

wild about me and I imagine it. I imagine it wrong.

(I’d be less honest if this poem were written

//

to somebody else, but again I remind you

dear reader, you live inside this body with me.

Can you hear me? Is it you, better half?

Are we the same?) I’m sitting here, we’re sitting here.

//

That ship is gone finally from our sliver of the water

and I don’t know what to look at. How beautiful

today is despite the wind. I can look at anything.

The weeds in the sidewalk cracks, the split

//

in the white concrete, the mountains painted

onto the pillars holding the highway up.

But moving things are easier to focus on.

I’ve spent too much time with my eyes roaming.

//

That beige minivan, vomit-green Toyota Tacoma,

mauve Honda Civic passing on the highway are too quick

and people, well. I’ve already spent too much

time watching people and here we are.

This poem was included in my book "I want you to feel ugly, too," which can be read on issuu.

Read part 1 of this poem

Read part 2 of this poem

Read part 3 of this poem

Read part 5 of this poem