Reasons to Write Poems (annotated)

PLEASE PAY ATTENTION TO ME
(even though this book is closed
and under my pillow and under my head
and my hair has a big goose-egg tangle
in it so probably you are already paying
attention to me) TIME TO EXORCISE
(it was a slimy thing I called it like a worm
it was connected to menstrual cramps but
also to when you’re lying in bed thinking
you are probably an alien and the ache
is palpable and is it some weird shame
or is it a piece of the mother ship or did
you only eat too much Cracklin Oat Bran)
LET’S PLAY DRESS-UP (my mom
started letting me wear lipstick to sailing
lessons when I was thirteen but only
this tasteful sheer wine-colored stuff
and anyway I also had to have a French
braid and wear aqua sox so it was a zero
sum situation and later I got a pair
of those Clueless high-heeled mary-janes
so of course those made it into the poems
and vice versa) WHY WON’T YOU LOVE
ME (that’s the same as number one I guess
but in WHY WON’T YOU LOVE ME you
can make someone up who is not entirely
unlike Trent Reznor but in your English
class) I HATE THOSE FUCKING GIRLS
(they have ruined my life! They are so fake.)
I CAN’T HELP IT (this is the best one and
all the all-stars will tell you this one without
blinking it’s like you open your mouth and
this happens and you’re sitting on the bus
and it happens and skulking at recess it
happens and hulking around at the back
of the room at a boy-girl party not wearing
a bra because you don’t have to wear one
it happens so you go in the bathroom and
do it or you go up to a bench and do it or
you look out the window and do it you can’t
help it and it must happen to everyone and
your hand hurts from doing it your jaw
hurts from doing it every ticket stub
in your purse is covered with it every napkin
and scrap of newspaper is covered
with it and your desk and your chair and
when someone asks you why it feels
good to have it like a disease! I CAN’T
HELP IT but the truth is once things
start getting better and somebody
wants to make out with you and watch TV
together and also there is pretty good stuff
on TV and also when you have a glass
of wine it doesn’t really feel like your teeth
are velvet anymore so you don’t have to yell
about that anymore the truth is you can
probably help it. So you might as well stop
but sometimes it’s like it was those days
when it wouldn’t stop so you’d say)
PLEASE (you’d write it on a placemat
hoping someone would notice at lunch hoping
someone would bring you like an aspirin
or something because whether or not
it is actually pain or not you probably
diagnosis or not mothership or not
very special or not still want everyone to)
PAY ATTENTION TO ME!