“Wasted”

90 pounds when she left him
my mother says I am
too young to know the significance

of weight old enough
only to think that 90 pounds
sounds like the feminine ideal

Wasted to perfection

At the first sight of my own blood
I screamed so they say
I like to imagine I remember

drops of red on shattered glass
at the first sight of my own blood
I understood something

not right in my bones

There was no money then
for nursing students all women
they used each other’s bodies like mannequins

phlebotomy practice in dorm room bunk beds
bright young women atomic futures
covered in bruises like heroin addicts

Bruises like finger marks

or maybe they were no one
would tell me when his hands
released their hold

I know you want to help
she says on the hotline
in the hot seat she was

Hot when she was dying

She threw the blankets off
every time we covered her back up
tied to the bed conscious enough

to mourn she cried
not for her children but for the feral
black cat she fed in the backyard

Cleanup teams these days

they work too fast you
couldn’t tell a bomb landed
here two weeks ago

two years two decades
they sweep survivors
up with the rubble and

move
move
move
move

Something still
not right in my bones