Thursday Nov 21

On Hiatus

CM Burroughs - Poetry

CM Burroughs has been a fellow of Yaddo, The MacDowell Colony, and the Cave Canem Foundation. The Vital System, her debut collection of poetry, was published by Tupelo Press in Fall 2012. Her poetry has appeared in journals including Ploughshares, jubilat, Callaloo, VOLT, and Bat City Review. She is the Elma Stuckey Poet in Residence at Columbia College of Chicago.  Visit her web site here.
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My Helpless Need to Repeat, Re-view, Re-vise
 
 
If the strands on my head all lead to my thinking of my self in all immediate spaces,
I visit a therapist to get out of my head, but say
 
I, I, I
 
Primp:  the nervous tick. 
Performance:  please observe.
 
She primps in the powder room.  She performs in public.  She visits a therapist to leave her self with someone else.  Repeat I, I, I.
 
I must tell you, and possibly you know, there is only this stage.
 
 
 
The Question Tossed at You
 
 
# of partners in lifetime? ________
 
           
Do I or don’t I count ________?  We, she and I, weren’t ________, but were definitely ________.
 
I imagined ________ her, but couldn’t cunt-up when it counted.
 
He and I, sweet-________ for __,___,____ minutes __,_____ hours…days. 
 
I _____-ed him.   He _____-ed me.  I think.  One, for sure.
 
 
No aqua-he’s.  No gilled-she’s.   
No Evidence.  I wash the
panties, throw them
out, no leftover look how wet. 
I clean them after I come.  Although,
 
                                                              ________ and me, we laid in it.  But then, that was love.
 
 
 
I’m sayin, soon as he said Take off that red dress… I was naked-golden, tender kisses, round and round and round we go, no how you doin lil mama, lemme whisper in your ear, but
 
                                                                                                                        how amazing. 
 
 
# of partners in lifetime? ________
 
            …write “Amazing.”