Pantoum: Prozac
Camille Ferguson

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I am the sidewalk the April sun pummels,
so bludgeoned with light that the cold I am I cannot feel.
I’ve tucked my sadness seed inside of me for the winter,
however long it may last.

So bludgeoned with light that the cold I am, I cannot feel,
I swallow fast happiness, (encapsulated in collagen, skin and bones)
however long it may last,
the dumb numb to which I succumb.

I swallow fast: happiness, encapsulated in collagen, skin, and bones,
the bitter chalk, the trigger of the tongue delivers
the dumb numb to which I succumb.
I haven’t cried in one hundred days.

The bitter chalk the trigger of the tongue delivers
pumps the life through me so gently I can hardly feel it—
I haven’t cried in one hundred days.
I’m trying to remember to forget the ache in me I almost miss.

Pump life through me, gently, so I can feel it—
raw and unhinging, like daybreak without sleep.
I’m trying to remember the ache in me I almost miss,
that un-bloomed knot of pansies, threaded through my ribs.

Raw and unhinging, like daybreak without sleep,
I think: maybe I’ll want again to feel profusely.
That absurd knot of pansies threaded through my ribs
is blooming towards my throat.

I think, maybe, I want to feel again—profusely.
Honey nectar, sky of amber, sun grit-locked inside my teeth;
giltlight   blooming   ridiculous     hope.
I am   goldenrod,   I am   four AM,   I am   coming home.