People call me a freak, but
I got a beauty of my own.
It's in the spray of scars across
my cheek, it flaps tattooed wings
around my wrist; it drops stares
at a glance. It's in the way
I slide my eyes beneath the gut,
caressing the decay within.
Nothing of them is intrinsic to me.

The face that passes with mine
along rippled street windows
reflects itself in the crowd,
bright monster constrained to flesh.
I lick at sores that never heal,
I carry my chaos on my skin.
It lies damp in the folds;
sweet sweat of my birth.

The hands that hold mine dance
hidden in my pockets, fingers loosed
by the titters of the crowd.
Me, myself, and I bitches tease the disease,
insensate tongues kiss my rings-
lips like prayers, breath like wine.
They swallow my spit in gagging gulps.

People call me sick, but I got
a cure of my own. It's in the fear
I suck from venomous minds, it's in
the pulse that bubbles under my prick
as I probe their daughters with deep
indifference. It's in screams that
razor through dead throats,
drained in complex puddles
on the floor of my concrete sarcophagus.

I walk these streets on silent feet,
my wake remembered on the faces
of the crowd. Their instincts recoil,
thrum my bones on ancient currents.
I got my own beauty.
I got my own cure.



�2005 by Tammy Turner