hisssss

I suppose
laws of heat and force
speak for hearts, too

because I am not a tea kettle
but something is steeping too long
in my chest
a rolling boil bleaching my ribs
and this skull mulls it with a sick spice
ballooning the steam inside,
holding everything in
with the tightest lids of lips

I keep sitting, though,
on the quiet gas stove;
glass alone, no bone or nerve
lurks to be red and raw the next day -
I've picked off all my skin and left
a smooth ceramic curve.
Maybe I remember
a time when I poured whatever
was inside, water, words;
when fear was like the winter out there
and I was safe,
and there was so much tea
I would make and make it
cozy, naked

now
I can only sit - sit and hold
 the hottest, strongest guts
while they heat and heat and bubble up -
a handle of a waist, and wait
to be served

or spilled, better -
to shatter sharp and wet
and for the tea to be a dead, dry dream
under a scarlet kitchen's smithereens
burned

but for now the night is silent
only moonwashed tile and Marlboro smoke

and I am silent
with shouting blood

I have locked up so much heat, and

these things still leak
from the eyes - hot beads,
and from ears
mist screeches,
hisses.
I suppose
that's what this is.