Ben Gurion's Tomb

I can feel the bodies piling up. Mine’s in there too. The paved road warps and I weep because despite the endless conflict, all is unrested - I watch a girl from the bus window run home down a dirt road back to her goats and chores, I don’t know what she’s running from or towards and neither do I.  I see tree stumps and garbage littered out of cans and beneath ocean liners.  God damn the world is so fucking beautiful and epic and simple.  Why is it so hard to see that? Why has it always been so hard? I can’t get their faces, that window, that gun, his dirty scowling bald mouth out of my god damn head. At the wonders of the world, I’m so overcome with joy and the horrors of history: mine and theirs and yours. I know you. I know you’ve suffered; I know you still .  I don’t know when it will end, if ever. I know I’m still waiting. I see their young playful faces, happy and playing, not (seeming) afraid, even though their jungle gym is in a bomb shelter and joy has a limit of 15 seconds in case the sirens ring and the rockets red blaze, bursting at home, taking their days and friends and limbs.  Chances are far and few and good ones are hard to forget and bad ones shape who we become.  Meanwhile, I’m overwhelmed by the world; when did we invent buses and satellites and nail polish.  I feel like I’ve been asleep for centuries and now I’m here once again, now on the same, yet vastly changed land and my mission is to re-purify this place and make sure it survives.  Where is the balance? Swap the slums and the mansions. Bask your head and blow me. I’m ready for sleep. Different fascinates me; why does hatred deal in fear and what’s unknown then breed as addiction?

I’m still turning away from your window, eyes opening on a pouring pane and your shadowed humping beast of a body.  I’m still walking down the aisle and looking at your stupid clothes and the make up over the hole in the middle of your face I never kissed (while it was still breathing). I’m still picturing talons growing from my nail beds and scratching out your eye balls and tearing off your skin.  I’m still scared.

I wanna skin all my skin off because I don’t know where you touched me and I don’t want to be the remnants of you lingering on my body. You make me sick/I’m sick with myself.  I don’t want to have that conversation with everyone I fall in love with. That I’m damaged. That my parts were used shortly unbeknownst to me. I don’t want to look pathetic and weak and sad and scared. I don’t want to panic when someone comes near. Everyone has their own 15 seconds, and there’s a reason we all grip to stay there too.