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That’s Enough, Mr. Butterfly
- University of Illinois Press
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69 That’s Enough, Mr. Butterfly The tortures have been enough today, Mr. Butterfly. The sores are opening on my skin. I feel a bulging beneath, a horrible bloating of the glands and vessels, a stretching taut of the muscular tissues. Oh rusted-out vehicular body. Pig-gut blown for a ball. When he asked if I had standards, I thought he meant like golden candlesticks. The tiny perfume bottles arranged on their silver tray, here by the mirror, here by the cracked painting of the owl. The lotions in descending order by size, by shape of packaging, the superĀcial reckoning of place. For I must apply the salve to produce the new skin at the rate the old skin is falling off. Though I could scrape the skin off faster. Look at me!, I shout clawing to the Listeners. Look!, I shout to the Lookers. I’m a tiger!! I’m a she-wolf! I’m a nanny-goat! Oh, tiny ladybird beetle, you’re not as nice a beetle as people think you are. 70 Outside, the church bells parcel the wait: each hour tolls bright, then drags its cape behind. Or each hour, on the hour, a new beaker smashed, the interim minutes the languid ooze bent to press its widening chemical burn, its unstoppable circumference— Or when the hour snaps open like a magician’s bouquet: fresh flowers on a fresh grave. Empty into me, the hour says. Empty, says the hour. And the gaping that remains, for what is it I contain within, exactly? I pull the pulp from sores while more sores blossom. Soon, my face—the indistinguishable tears burning as they slide from one cavity to another, electric body of sockets— Oh, damselfly! The leaves are of so many colors, like a sunburst! Oh damselfly! The pond is so wet this afternoon! The grass has grown so high! Each blade waves like a tall flexible tower! Each blade bends like a flaccid slingshot! Each whistles like an invisible street urchin, like the wind roped through excavated chambers, a desiccated nautilus strung with Ālaments of gold— Damselfly, is it coiling or unraveling? So many spheres, are the suns being born? ...