For The Days When I Wonder

I wonder what I will become when I die
my everything is already too big and I already leave
carcasses trailing behind my shadow
I already walk through walls like a ghost
and I wonder, will they read my words and say
"poor thing. she was very sad."
or will they say "I am sorry for the ones
she loved." or perhaps will they say
nothing at all. perhaps I will not be read.

I am sorry, as well, for the ones I loved
for I am thick with tree bark and maple sap
I taste sweet when tempered or diluted, but
I will not leave your skin. something in my scent
will linger and cling to you like a virus that dies
if left alone. and sometimes I am so small
that magnifying glasses glance over me like blind helicopters
combing the landscape for fugitives, and sometimes
I am so expansive that I encompass oceans
and drown kind sailors who only meant
to make their living that day, but I had other plans.

I write myself into little boxes with dark walls
you would think I love bear traps the way I let them
catch my ankles so well. I paint monsters on my skin
and I watch myself become a morsel for hungry gods
I make myself less than what a penny is worth these days.
but then again, I have my moments.
I am fiercer than grizzlies sometimes and I am tall.
and if I leave carcasses in my wake, I will leave them smiling.
I already find myself on stilts half the time,
tent-high and so much wider than my own striped skin
that I do not fit inside myself. I topple forward
most days, I cannot find my balance because I am
too far lost in the stratosphere. It is the only place
large enough to hold my hand.

but it is lovely inside the sky.
and I wonder what I will become when my body is gone
and all that remains are the pictures I drew in black and white
I wonder what I will be when all I am is
this... these words. I cannot imagine my everything contained
on a handful of pages bound between paperback covers.
perhaps people will say I was just a sad girl with a pen.
perhaps the ones I loved will tell them
otherwise.