Now is no time for pity and compunction

 

I will carry you around like a baby

 

You are a piggie and I will eat you

 

Savages are infinitely happier

 

I would abandon my island for you

 

(This is probably untrue)

 

I have such mosquito innards

 

My bone condition is suck

 

Let me other you out of your skeleton

 

You are calico cotton and powder

 

Let me throw my fire body on you

 

You will never tell others Don’t be afraid

 

There are so many ways to row away

 

I can’t even make new language for it

 

I am tired of want so I use old language

 

Old language is old and mine to use

 

 

—-

 

 

Melissa Broder is the author of the poetry collections Meat Heart and When You Say One Thing But Mean Your Mother. She lives in Brooklyn.