 My body is finally useful. Into the green kitchen bucket with the bitter carrot tops, collard ribs, dry pulp from the juicer, burned heels, draincatcher leavings, useless skins of things or their stringy hearts, now I add my nail clippings and clumps of hair that catch in the brush. This is the way my mind chooses to learn a hard thing, gently, but my body rushes way ahead to the black box in the yard with the mail-order worms, embracing the ailanthus trash, the winter-slimed impatiens. It's lost interest in the distinction between me and not me, thrown open the borders to people I've been too shy to even say hello to: fungus rings germinate in all my dark, moist places, a rash decorates my white torso like pink point de Venise blooming on a lichenous log, my tongue wears a white scum and a sour, clabbered smell. Little bears nose through my guts for soft grubs, and Destroying Angel lifts its wild orchid umbrella where my heart used to be. In hardest winter, snow never settles where I lie, because homely rot-- the common chemistry of things coming apart-- gives off a friendly, social warmth, almost as if finally I am still alive. |
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