Dear Mom,
Location
I don’t go to church anymore,
there’s no sleep for the restless.
I spend my days with a crooked wishbone,
the meat still sticking to it,
and our shed smells like the gasoline
that burned out of me years ago.
Home isn't where the heart is.
It’s where your dead skin rests,
curled up at the end of your bed.
Home is where the cocoon was shattered,
and I think you miss your cocoon.
I think its shell is the crack in your grandmother’s tombstone,
the same one you pressed your forehead against
when you fell to your knees
and now you wanna crawl back in.
Two years ago I lit a match,
I watched myself shrivel and coil
into a snake no one wanted to dance with.
My throat’s a little dry now,
I’m a little burnt out now,
but I can’t go to church anymore.
Because I can’t go to sleep if I don’t know how to live
and I tried to give up but the world wouldn’t let me
and I guess home is where the world lets you sigh.