New Skin (She's a gravebound tree)

Whose your new skin now?

A handsome man,

With handsome hands,

Or bloodshot eyes

From long nights

Spent charming you

Over cups of coffee;

Talking his way

Into your pants,

While you slide

Into his skin?

Will it fit?

Stretch to accompany two,

Or will you hollow

Him out, viscera and vital

Soul and style

Until there's only you?

Loving comes easy

To those who can't love,

Catch any bird and

A blindgirl told,

Will call it a dove.

Searching for souls

On golden coasts,

Or in bottoms of bottles,

Of poison or pills.

You've got a long

Way to grow

Like roots into the earth

Burrow like crawling fingers

Away from the light

In that capricious search

For solitude, definition,

A sense of being real;

You upturned tree,

Skyward rooted

All self deception and dishonesty,

Filthy floored canopy,

Unaware of the absurdity

Of wrenching open third eyes

Painted on in lipstick

So delightfully flippant

With all the suits you leave behind.

Will that handsome man

Be able to stand

The sight of you in years?

When he sees behind the bark,

To the wormy wood within?

Will he wonder what happened

When you've taken all you can?

And like the roots of grave bound trees

You've burrowed deep

In the carrion heap

Of his identity at peace?

What will you take

And leave in your wake,

Only dirt, my former

fair-weather friend?