Everyone Sleeps,

Everyone.

Teachers.

Fathers.

Monsters.

Girls.

Boys.

We all get tired and have to take a break,

From being sad,

Or wanting to be sad,

Even from being ecstatic and frantic,

The girls with legs have to stop and lean against the walls that lace up the backs of wild parties, I see them, they pause,

To wipe it away,

before going back to the fields,

to combing the Earth,

to treading the tides,

Their heads bent in hopefully nothing,

Just heat and exhaust.

But most likely something,

Statistically anyway,

Everyone sleeps.

Everyone has some innocent process of preparing for bed.

Some simple routine of enamel,

of rinse,

of snuggle,

and breath.

I remember the last time I took a bath.

It was also the last time I felt attractive,

Desirable,

Worthy and ready for the mystery of pleasure,

Sexy, like the girls I would later hate at wild parties.

Girls in lean, and drag, and shot, and safety, fishy nets around their fully developed legs.

I remember the last time I took a bath.

I was four.

I remember I wrapped the towel around me extra tight once it was all over,

Tight like the dresses I saw on TV when I stayed up too late,

Tight like the cup you make with your hands when you're whispering a secret.

Tight like the seal on the coffin you're paying for,

Tight like the things you keep even from yourself,

Tight and deep for only so long until it seeps through to your day chores in odorless forms of acne and bulimia.

I slinked passed the threshold that supported my father in my cute little terry cloth number,

I paraded and modeled my way out to the couch where my oblivious, absent, mother sat reading.

And I could tell by the shade of grey in her left iris that something was wrong,

And I could tell by the slope of her nose that she was jealous, and wounded,

That something had been going on,

You think she's reading architecture books,

But, tapped inside those hard covers are pamphlets on how to be the most selfish person in the world.

He poured my last bath down the drain and put me to bed.

She did what she does best, nothing.

I remember the first night I prayed,

Something other then the usual now I lay me down,

I prayed that I wasn't in trouble,

I prayed that my kitty was safe,

I prayed for a miracle to bring him home,

I prayed for fields to plow,

And water to tread,

And grace to save.

A wretch like me,

Skin and Toast