Physical World

Growing, shrinking

I don’t take care of it

‘cause it’s “what’s inside that counts”

And I’m scared of it--

The way it binds me to the “physical world”

How it reminds me:

Life’s a leaf in October

But there’s no “physical world”--

There’s “no inside or out”

Air flows through the mouth

And into the blood

I wanted to see

In the third grade:

Tiny

Medieval sword--

From my grandfather in Spain--

Into my stomach

Without pain

Or discovery

Through screams she found me

So no insides came out

I wake alone at night

To my anxious heart

Running wild in my chest

A reminder

That I have a body

So it thumps harder: