the carousel
it is peak summer
and I am eating
600 calories
per day
melting
in a sun-soaked
rose-tinted
spun-sugar
euphoria
feeling like a god
high on my body
eating itself
i think when you burn
you burn ecstatically
there in a room full of unblinking people
flames cartwheeled from my mouth
cackled like laughter
what do you think happens
to a body that bends
its own truth backwards?
reeling in the negative space
death seemed beautiful
in the way absence
seems beautiful
so quiet
and sterile
and clean
monologue of a jezebel (in five parts)
i.
white boy is unaccustomed
to staring or else
gets off on it
ii.
on the phone at 3am
when the air is heaviest
white boy says he’d make me
his girlfriend says
but
he’s uncertain
if he could ever
bring me home says
his father would approve
as his father approves
of all his sexcapades
but Spring Hill
is a small town
rural you know
iii.
white boy loves my body
hates that he loves my body
and I understand
because I hate my body too
have resigned myself
to my rotting alter
its disproportion
the width of my thighs
spilling across a seat
i need white boy to tell me
i’m pretty to tell me i’m beautiful
words white boys only use
for white girls
iv.
white boy tongues
the deepest parts of me
gnaws through my legs
thick and unladylike
picks tiny black hairs
from between his teeth
he runs his hands
down the length of me
smooth as a palm run
through sand – deliberate
as an angel appearing
v.
white boy is problematic
to say the least
but when he kneels
to fuck me I am certain
he is seeing god
Lea Anderson holds an MFA in poetry from The New School. Her poems and other writing have appeared or are forthcoming in SWWIM, Jai-Alai Magazine, and Luna Luna. Follow her on Twitter @leaeanderson
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