no body

you were born from fucking, made to live inside it.
every night before sleep i imagine the gun was real and i am far from here, overspilling.
there are eyes inside. my body falls asleep on every stranger’s couch.
give me one space where it stops beating.

he marries me when i’m seventeen, everywhere i go i am aware of the outline of my face.
grandfather once spoke of his father's creation, spread to be of one through town.
she holds my hand scanned full of wires. he cries in my arms
promises that he will never leave me as he left us.
i hold my mind at the end of the barrel.

they ask for examples and there are none.
maybe it could have been him, if he lived.
the answer is in that.

it was an accident before. don’t you remember that she was once removed?
holds my legs spread against arms, rocks with his leg until it starts again.
women say the pain comes from being different. i’m not sure what the difference is.
it's nothing special. life, before anything, is what happens to you.

i know what i am.