be my talismanic property
be my new
prize for wanting
the narcissism
of this hot world
cut loose like a blimp
I came to revirginize
my willpower, a white
light that won’t burn
it made me its food
in the slow yes of drought
the plump kleptomania
of my gaze has spread
out over everything
like the stretched spine
of a whirlpool, the frenzy
of a sealed clam, I am a woman
on the brink of a recital
which means nothing
like a good performer
I move like gauze
pith, I blink, I spit
out desire, its filament
biting up the hand
so long before you I sat on
the earth like a crane, eyes queued
open with rope, my mind is
everything you want, overfed
baby and its bouquet of teeth
fish scales fileted like new perfume
the tyranny of my going
will keep you alive
Cleo Abramian lives and writes in Western Mass. Her poems have appeared in Shitwonder, b l u s h, dirt child, Solar Journal and elsewhere. Her chapbook, debt, is forthcoming from b l u s h later this year. She is currently an MFA candidate at UMass Amherst’s Poetry program.
