Lyn Lifshin: poem

THE MAD GIRL IS SICK OF HAVING INK ALL OVER HER FINGERS

of leaving a trail of
blue like Gretel's
crumbs any mugger
could track her with,

sure she's lost in
a cobalt daze. Her
bullet slippers
are more blue than

flesh, her cream
jacket's splotched
with midnight. If
she could just grow a

blue startling
as sapphire. But
the blue is heavy
as the word sarcoma.

It jolts up like a
penis without any
power, too flabby
to open doors. If

she could pack the
darkness into a
nub that would
grow out of her,

be her penis,
her hard blood
probing and pushing
a way into a cove,

a cave a place of
comfort maybe
she'd feel held
and circled and
what was thick
in her could be
shared