Just a One of the Way

Not knowing what she wants,
But wanting the dreams to stop!
Crawled into a medicine chest,
And opened all the bottle caps.
She downed her happy nights.
Swallowed the ill mornings.
She ate her clock of birth control.
Swallowed a Sunday of pain.
She even took the pills she saved
For the party next week.
Then from the edge of the tub
Put her light head on the sink.
One elbow beside her shape.
One elbow in front of her eyes.

In dreams they pulled her hair in handfuls
Like she was someone's mom.
How was she restored from this?
They were served a broiled horse.

She stood, but couldn't, and heard
A name inside her head.
Her name was Lisa still.
Wondered how a boy could love
Those bony ankles of her feet.
Those thin white legs of hers.
Wondered why she loved them back,
But knew she never did.

In dreams her hand was in a box
While the car ran through the woods.
Jammed from tree to tree, and quick,
Then went and smashed an oak head on.
Forced her face through broken glass,
And made a bad turn of her arm.
They ate the broiled hearts of palm.

She might have slipped onto the floor.
A side of her arm on side of the tub.
Thin fingers waved the end of life.
Our Lisa looked like a seizure,
And did not fight at all.

In dreams she walked upturned inside a stream.
Walked on her hands with day above her chest.
In drowning could not reach the air with her lungs.
She had to move so slow.
A move too quick; the turtles would spook.
They ate the broiled turtles inside a shell.

Lisa lost her name sometime,
And was no longer loved.
When two days later they opened the door,
No one could love her anymore.