New Dollbaby Piece up at Jacket2: EXTREME TEXTS

From:

 Extreme texts

Edited by Divya Victor

Dollbaby

The poetics of hysteria and motherhood

MEGAN BURNS

Trigger warning: abuse, suicide

The following document is an archive of two years of my life when I lost custody of my children after I tried to end an abusive marriage. The court took my kids from me based on the art I create: appropriately, the art in this case centers around historical instances when real women also lost their voices, autonomy, and their lives due to their own inability to have freedom and safety in this world. It’s 2019, and women are still not safe. I want to send the song of this text into the future until the answer is sure: when are women going to be safe in this world?

Read full piece at Jacket2:

http://jacket2.org/poems/dollbaby

RE: Survival

imagine we still spoke
& you asked me
what is the most terrible thing
that happened to you

and i turn, facing you
perhaps in bed
as the morning light filters through dusty slats
june below sea level in a city, listing to sink

here naked, covers strewn around our ankles
the a/c never stops humming
we barely touch, the heat of our skin
filling the emptiness

and i get lost in the deep swell
of your eyes upon me
to think in all of this chaos
you could see

the answer
i whisper into the palm
of your hand
                            "time"

REND

The wolf song is the sound of the rending you will suffer,

in itself a murdering.    – A. Carter, The Company of Wolves

Rend

for dean

i.

dropped spit

a beast desires most

violence contained

slaps the edge of coat here

bristling, says: “what am i”

says: “good girl”

says: “hold down”

i bend where i can’t translate

my body betrays

collar this dream

i am led

ii.

travel unmapped darkness

a veil drops

to skin

think of how we’ll escape

hung on the hook

called time

we coat the hours

i will inside you anyway

sing & dig in

teeth bared

iii.

carnage

terrible terrain

the animal of us attacked

to pin me under

to wipe your hand

down the mask

of memory

we built in temporary frames

a den of hungers

not asleep, not awake

but suspended

iv.

have you known

such heat as i have known

bite down enough

tremble each limb till

it lets go its safety

its fiction of

i was strong

against         sometimes

being left

is a gift

v.

don’t ask me to love

outside the poem

its safety net of syllables

dangling, i would open beneath

let it fall

let it fall apart

i lose the ability to be afraid

in measured doses

torn muzzle to trade instead

a sacrifice of shattered

points, light braided

to break    bloodied maw

call forth