They got it wrong, the Readers:
The pinstripe critics
Who burrowed into
Our textual breasts.

Good as I been to you,
I don’t expect pity,
but maybe,
a bit of rage.

They don’t remember
My heels clicking through your spine.

They’re so kind –
All this trial and testimony.
That’s not the best of me.

Oh, but if you blame me –

Still my stomach twitches
Like a cat plucking
Feathers from
A bird

To see you wince like that.

That’s just the elegy they wrote for me
And filled my sleeves with -
Until clapping was only
The crackling of the sheaves.

There’s no text written gonna save my skin.

So I curse the cure you put on me –
This habit fits so clumsily.
You are all the love
I can stand.