Tonight's Poet Corner: Crybaby

Crybaby
by Belinda Roddie

I can start counting how many times
I've cried over things you can't see without
a microscope, but my memories all collapse
into one big black hole, and I always forget
if I've left off on one or ten or fifteen hundred.
No, I'm not interested in rehashing old stories,

or using my thumb to paint eyes that see only
into the past, with dilating pupils. If I only
just stopped looking for colors that didn't exist,
I wouldn't get so emotional over a rainbow, or
a Jackson Pollock heart attack on canvas, or
the last time you held my hand at just the right

angle while we were walking into a purple sunset.
I am stained glass: Vivid, but fragile. I can
withstand only some natural disasters. Rain doesn't
do much damage; it shows up under my eyes
a lot. It streaks my cheeks with dust, and I have to
wash away each sorrow like a separate blotch,

finding new erosion with each sensation of panic
rendering me unstable and dazed. I don't have
a fuse - I just explode without pretense. Volcanoes
have nothing on my eruption itinerary. When
the episode stops, and my body's ceased shaking
like the ground on a good day, I can laugh

just as easily as I wept. I could add this moment
to the list if I wanted to, but my fingers cramp
up more these days, and the pain keeps the
paper blank. So I soak my hands in warm water
and salt before I go to bed. And I have uneasy
dreams at night, where I'm Alice in Wonderland,
floating in an endless ocean of her own tears.