from Quatrains: Second Hundred

107

I have always been the way I am

even when I wasn't the way I am

and none can ever know the way I am

because I am not merely the way I am

122

Him or someone else, what's it to me

if every time I'm lonely afterward?

Alone here with my moribility . . .

if there only were such a lovely word . . .

124

These hemorrhoids, this bleeding from behind . . .

I'm spilling out of all my holes—yes, all.

My ass is wrecked . . . (My speech is so refined . . .)

There ought to be a plumber I could call.

154

You want to die with me, you dumb shit?

Excavate my heart with your shovel?

This is getting to be a hell of a habit.

Want me to swear on my knees? Grovel?