Tonight's Poet Corner: Give Me A Chance

Give Me A Chance
by Belinda Roddie

For one day, just
try to see me function like a
multiple circuit animal,
with paws settled in the dust,
teeth unbared, and the
extraordinarily minute touch of
genius (because you
can't use too much). Give me

one chance to offer you a
canvas so stained it's beautiful,
rather than hear the echos of
juvenile irrationality when a
disciplinarian bites her own
cuticles because she's so nervous
she'll sound

or look

or seem
the wrong thing.
Don't tell me I'm

not offering you three meals a day,
because I am. Hot lava
turns into gravy in my boat. I am not
stoked by the emptiness in my
room. I am not thrilled by the
on tap, chilled
reception of my intellect. I can

direct a sailboat away from the
sting of salt, but I can't promise that a
little foam won't bubble around your
clogs. One day, I want to

see you in the corner, smiling at the
splash of color on all my children's
faces - not the assumption of pale
features on a cherub who
may have stepped into the path of a
stray scratch. You've seen
ten smiles before, yet you are so fucking
comfortable with pinning the tears on the
corduroy collar of my tailored guilt trip.
This is not

how I learn, or grow, or become stronger.
This freezes me like chemicals,
stirred to cause a reaction, but instead
forcing me to imbibe the maltov cocktail
that shakes me, and erupts in the back half of my
cerebral anxiety, and doesn't let me
love the things I am doing right.