This Calls for an Exorcism! 

I wanted to belt one of those nasty 
guttural screams, like a long-dead 
hollywood actress in a movie I’m too 
afraid to watch. “I hate gore” I tell 
people, but how poetic it must feel to be 
covered in the innards of a pig. Pretty, 
done-up face splattered in thick blood and 
smeared in sweat, ink and bile, perfume. 
I’m logical. But sometimes I’m clawing. 
At my eyes, and neck. Like a possessed. 
A panic, conceived and birthed in the manic of 
self-loathing. 

“‘I’m not a real poet’ says the poet” 
Said a poet, 
now says I. 

On the bathroom floor, in the dark, 
I shake with rage and lust
for violence. Force my nails into my palms: I need to lap up the blood, that I swear pools in the basin of my fist like tears once did in the crease on either side of my nose. I’m not wailing out of pain, but 
the satisfaction of tearing 
my warming skin from my frailing 
bones. I have to tell my mother to 
hide the scissors: my gut feels awfully pierce-able. Take the towel from my 
long, strong fingers; I’m trying to suffocate myself. Every tendon in this body is trying to bend the wrong way. I’ve convinced my parents to order the 
priest, hold me down and chant a 
prayer. Pull the Devil out of this growing chest. Rip me open and carve me out. Unravel my intestines like a roll of film. My restless arms need the authorities to strap me to a bed and shriek in my face ‘till 
I come to my senses. End me, infect 
me, declare me brain-dead, I’d rather be numb than curling in my bed. I’m gasping
and grasping at the door. 
I’m scared that I like it, 
this spirit in my veins, it never controlled me until today. So, I heard the voices 
over the phone, all I want is for Mama to listen. My eyes are screaming and trying their best “this calls for an exorcism!”

Roaring (Screaming) 20s 

It is the Roaring (Screaming) 20s. 
Everyone is in their own world 
we all think we deserve one. 
We are all at war, we are rotting, 
twisted, 
mentally ill. 

We all hate, 
worship, 
envy one another. 
I am grinning on the sidelines, 
like a Goddess 
above them all! 

Can't decipher, 
who is playing the game?
who is manipulating the referee? 

I am busy admiring myself 
watching my shapely reflection on this mirrored ceiling 
as I float through the water. 

Gaining self awareness at ten 
watching grown men have revelations 
I had at eleven. 

Tell me my generation is all narcissistic teens 
I’d love to hear it, 
happy to be a part of it! 
Happy to watch us be blamed 
for destroying a planet we were labored into 
a mere minute ago (we are infants in this timeline) 

Happy to be called lazy, 
spoiled, 
incomparable to the God-like generations before us. 
We are going to raise children

who watch the world collapse 
on (Apple) VR headsets. 

Irony tastes like my grandmother's cooking 
when she tells me 
my Peers will be the downfall! 

When she drove Volkswagens 
smoked a pack a day 
showered for an hour every time 

She and I both think its laughable 
how we fight the people 
we are inevitably intertwined with. 
Going down together 
blaming the people 
we pull with us (Our elders are the weighted leeches on our ankles) 

I am no god 
no savior. 
Just laughing at our silly flailing arms trying to resist gravity.

Oh well, I suppose we are in too deep 
I suggest we keep kicking 
our bodies will surface eventually. 
The aliens can find our fucked up palaces.