Untitled

I wonder if my body

or my husband (What's 

your name again?)

will release me from

one of these prisons?  I lay

here wondering if its

a cell of graying, stretching skin

frayed in its edges and cuticles.

Minnesota’s nickname is “Land of 10,000 Lakes”;

"Land of 10,000 Liver Spots" is my body's

nickname. Dotted and mottled lakes of

blurred brown leaking into vacant

pale spaces a field misspent, bereft. Or is

it four walls with a 10’x12’ checker-board

floor stained with urine. Whoever

thought that pale-green paint

(sea –foam is for mother-in-law suites)

soothed hot, leaking nerves was an asshole.

Obviously he doesn’t know

a thing about ripe pain.

The point, of course, is

that I cannot.