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From Eckhart Tolle’s The Power of Now, the pain-body is “a negative energy field that can take us over, that feeds on our pain and wants our pain to continue and increase.” ~ Ordinary Genius, A Guide for the Poet Within by Kim Addonizio

i draw my pain-body
i have defined it.
two distinct, indigestible flavors:
the Yawn and a Cheshire cat

Yawn: noun and verb
        a bored reaction or manifestation
        gracing the countenance of
        familial females
        i am dull, tedious
        frequently glossed over
        seldom heard

Cheshire cat: noun, fictional character
        smug & serene
        it sees, it knows, it adjudicates my crimes
        its mischievous grin
        mocks and flays me
        what were you thinking
        you stupid, stupid girl

i know what they look like
these inner wanderers
they walk the footpaths of memory
they spread doubt and reproach
                six sailor dresses come spring
        our inauthentic sisterhood
absence of nurture
        absence of bonds

unrepentant enemies of an unstable childhood
        grown into bewildered womanhood
these arbiters of conscience and action
now sprung to life
now, malodorous memes

exposed as they now are, i will adapt
seek recourse in myself
remove from them the power
they’ve held over me for far too long

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Puppy tears through the deep powder
like a tractor-puller at the county fair.

my snow pants, Columbia Titanium, ear muffs and thick boots
enable me to not mind one little bit.

running in his wake
I’m laughing all the way….

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I want guacamole and refried beans
    left off my dinner plate

I prefer Special K
    in every scotcheroo

Silk stockings
    must drape across my candled nightstand

I want 400 rpms revving
    my engine’s manifold come daybreak

Henceforth, spider stew
    shall be leached from my intestines

I’d love to see gauzy halos
    atop every world

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electric-blue daisies
scatter across lycra and lace
she shields her eyes
from the morning’s glory

languid sighs contemplate every contour
of her spurious waste
too many years having left her
censured, unmoored

she feigns a coy gesture
removes her chemise
her halleluiah chorus oozes crisp clarity
ill-fitting decorum now unrestrained

exquisite bell-tones of make-believe
sublime realities come true at last
rhapsodies of love
reignite in smoke-purple rooms

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Suncatchers blind commuters on the sour streets of New Haven
as frogs croak wildly at 2 AM

Nylons slither down my scrawny legs
in obeisance to gravity

Mother’s glasses sit askew on her aquiline nose
after too many Mai Tai’s in the pre-dawn light

And you wonder why the mechanisms of Wall Street
interest me not in the least?

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No red ribbon
for the braids in my hair

No tucking in at night
with milk, warm bread and jam

No cheerful eyes of adoration
to power my day

No soothing words
or gentle caresses

No fiery passion for purple dogs
colored well within the lines

No standing O’s for grade school concerts
you were never there

What I don’t got

A mother’s love, warmly given