Be Careful What You Fall in Love With

I’m in the bathroom hurling my guts out. From inside me
comes a needle, a heart, a dozen paint chips
There is no solution to the repetition of morning

My roommate listens to the mice in the walls
entering their own golden age of discovery
Aren’t trees, storms, earth, stone just common things?

Another street, another continent maybe, but the same sun?
There is toothpaste in my hair, smothering the mites
I have fostered there across 800 generations

My roommate helps me hold my head up, puts my heart back
brushes color and sharpness off my knees
The year is 2025, and I am in my 2025th week of life

All around the earth life simmers into vapor
Demodex mites live 2-3 weeks. Domestic mice 2-3 years
The bathroom is old and tired, but still it has a window

And beyond that window, a winter, a weakening sun
Though studded with light, the sea is desolate
So desolate, it’s hard to imagine

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M.P. Carver is a poet and artist from Salem, MA. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Paterson Literary Review, Rattle, and Mantis, among others. Her second chapbook, Hard Up, is available now from Lily Poetry Review Books. She directs the Massachusetts Poetry Festival and co-founded and edits Molecule: A Tiny Lit Mag.