I am a scuffed silver pinball parachuting from one bad,
bad man to the next, bouncing from hard-edged lovers into the wall
trying, dying
to find a safe place to sleep
while maintaining breakneck velocity

been like this for years, beginning at birth
it only got bad when I got breasts but still
everybody thought the darkest girl in town
was half-feral, half-cruel
and they tempered me with needles for a little while
but I got the feeling back in my thighs, veins tightened,
and I made a break for it

skinny angry indie girl with tattoos and a leather jacket
so far on the left wing I fell into space, into anarchy
wishing I was with warhol but those days are gone
guess I'll have to be like georgia and make my own era

so again I am skittering from home to home,
lights bright above my head,
rocketing into strangers and leaving them spellbound
once in a while I do a slow roll, like lately,
but personally I prefer the recklessness of running.

will we measure success in quick fucks or
high-ceilinged homes with sprawling green yards
plastic surgery or books or IQ points or college degrees
in how many people know our names
when we breathe our way into that skinny strip of wood
yielding death, which isn't an end in as much as it is
change, 'cause even science believes in forever

what will the scoreboard say?
will the numbers write you an elegy?

and sometimes I feel that I am trapped in this body
its expiration date is a shield from understanding
like I should be able to climb outside myself
and become eternal.

and one day, I'll die.
and I don't know what dying is,
or what it means,
but I must make use of my days as they come,
one by one.
cause what comes up must come down,
and eventually,
someday,
I'll stop speeding.

but in this moment we are immortal
and they can't take away what you've done
so do everything.