I can't buy food without some of it arriving rotten.
Take the delicata squash sold by my farmer's market guy:
one tiny opalescent inchworm victorious and smug and opulent
in my ruin. Fuck you, I say and open the garbage can. Worms
make me violently sad. When we dissected one in sixth grade,
the amount of pins we had to use to splay it open --- nauseating.
Now the dog licks her lips when she sees them on the sidewalk
post-heavy rain. It's like yawning; I mirror her. So there's no cure
for my brain, apparently. But I still start each morning
with affirmations for the dog. _You are beautiful. You are smart._
_You are safe in this house, in this world, in this body, with me._
Once a man told me the same. He lit himself on fire a minute later.
It was beautiful. He told me we could have fun together and handed me
the lighter. Those flames: they just keep getting nearer and nearer and nearer.