The victimization of children is nowhere forbidden;

what is forbidden is to write about it.

– Alice Miller
i.
The first star pierces

with dead light. 
Is a dirge.

Is you. 
Is known by how it tugs,

draws into. Sight shall fill

with shapes.
How we monster a bed.




ii.
You are an ecological disaster.

All your teeth are falling out.

Because you refuse to speak,

to shout. You fill your veins

with swamp. Let your anger

be the climate, raging. 
Become sea flood. Salt yourself. 
Let crystals sting as you rub them

                                into your skin.




iii.
There is a man who claims to be your brother.

He teaches you to whimper with a full mouth.

He will lay his hands across naked sheets. 
A stain remains.
As does ink.




iv.
Night was created so the gods had somewhere to hide:

their sins; their sins; their sins. And us, made

in their image – minus wing or cloven hoof – we follow suit.




v.
At midnight,

gather all your teeth 
and bury them. 
At a crossroads.

In a cauldron.

In a coffin.




vi. 
That first star:

it can do nothing to save us

from ourselves,

from those men,

all ivory and ache. 
The first star weeps. 
Because to bear witness is a burden. 
And we cannot sleep. 
Leave your body:

as ghost

step into atramentous.