By Jordan Currie
Funny how monsters can keep praying on the bodies
of the young and beautiful in exchange for spotlights
(or, in exchange for nothing,
nothing but bloody lips and
vomit and runny mascara)
but a shoplifting incident eighteen years ago
while depressed and high
and panic
and a broken elbow
can cut the stream
a blemish which turns into a scar
until the typewriters shout,
“Comeback! Comeback! Comeback for the disgraced!”
as though we weren’t the ones disgracing.
Winona,
princess of darkness and eye roll,
ruler of lonesome goth girls in the cafeteria corner
human woman whose pain was put on a display
like pastries in a window sill
branded crazy
doe eyed and lashing out
proceed with caution
You did not need to “come back”
you did not need relevance to breathe
you did not need to tightrope walk on the edge of a pedestal
while poked and prodded with pen caps
and blinded by flash
You were here all along.