SERVICE INDUSTRY
Angel Rosen

i hid out too long	      	  on the outskirts of want 
immune to         insatiability  	   immune to desire
i was this god-winged girl, 
				pure, but horrible, too

i hid too long
stapling my virginity to my eyelashes
i blink & you want the idea of me
you want to introduce me to pleasure
but i warn you of the danger of naming things

i thought if i waited forever, a sexless poet, i could only ever
be wanted, yet unhad, like something behind glass,
tapped on but unpossessed

i needed that power to survive my female body.

& now i have words for desire that hurt to speak
& now i know the violence of wanting
& now i have to explain parts of myself away
& now i can’t be cured of the way i need
& now i am a hunter,
my bullet chasing the throat of a woman
too beautiful for me

at creation, i was a container
at creation, i was a mirror,

now, nothing fits and i can’t sing
to the rhythm that her hands instruct.
i have to close myself back up
so that if i am ever wanted again
(and how i pray for such pleasure),
her hands will touch something more
than just this place of exit.

i hid too long & now i am seen:
my grisly and unbearable hunger