The Last Time I Slept in This Bed

I was involved in the serious business

of ripping apart my own body.

I’d run my fingers over it,

seeking but never finding

the right point of entry,

so having to tear one myself,

though midway through

I’d always tire,

and let night enter

like a silver needle,

sewing my eyelids shut.

This was not an original practice,

but thinking, for a time, that it was

felt like being able to choose

when spring would arrive:

engineering an April

that opened like a parasol,

even in thoroughest winter.