i pick my teeth out, fingers stained red and tongue skating over empty gaps; practice speech sitting cross-legged on a bathroom floor, rot resting at the back of my throat and winter wrapping corrosive hands around bare skin. if i try hard enough, could i hew the personhood from myself and drag it spooled shapeless, luminous down the streets of a ruined city like the split-throat corpse of hector — if i cast myself as achilles, then who do i grieve?
who spilled the right into my organs, into
the open space of my stomach? i attempt to hollow myself out, but there is only bone and soft flesh, and winter covers my mouth when i ask for forgiveness. winter catches my spine with a claw when i beg permission, and want bleeds cold, bright out of me. just let me stand: i toss a bag of uprooted teeth into a black-watered pier and turn my back. winter drives me away with a lifeless body tracking behind us. don’t undo it, this once.
Kavi Kshiraj is a queer, Indo-American poet found in New Jersey. They spend time on hobbies such as writing, D&D, and their various identity crises.
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