by Sara Blaisdell
It’s like this. I drove, no one knew.
I drove around the beach,
thought of our binoculars and plans,
the stupid plans, to float away -
careless fisherpeople,
we said – never to return.
I’ve gained five pounds since.
I’d like to slice off pieces of myself.
I’m not talking about metaphors.
There are places where flesh should not be –
places where, however, there is flesh.
My little sisters, for example,
are still small and graceful,
like modern magazines.
The boat we should have taken –
right over there with its aged captain
and his ridiculous comb-over flapping around
like the sails- it wouldn’t have helped.
It was a wonderful thing, that boat, that life
of someone else’s.
Look, maybe we’ll do it sometime –
we’ll take that boat, or some other boat,
and we’ll eat fish and ripe oranges.
We’ll die in an existential fatness
unsurpassed by anyone.