THE GRUMBLING GOD
I made a list of the things I wanted to be:
ebullient, skinny, kind
I lit tea-lights, taped
the list to my refrigerator, tried
to remember how to pray
It mocked me as I filled my mouth
with muffins & that memory
of squeezing
your eyes into nomads
so I crumpled the guilt into a ball
& swallowed that too
then forced it all up
where I could see it
Now my stomach won't stop grumbling
You were supposed to be kind
This poem was originally published in the April 2015 issue of The Birds We Piled Loosely. Cover photograph by Darla Mottram.