Pain turns on its dull red warning light
dim and steady in the dark.

I remember real hunger,
the urgency,
a hollow pain roaring like the sea,
and through it all
the sense of the body
cutting its losses of the cells shutting down
one by one
the lights going out.

That hunger was bone chip sharp.

Don't think because I speak strong words
that I am always strong.
What moves through me
moves on and leaves me empty as a storm sewer
when the rain has gone.

My ribs squeal like a bad accordian.
Feed me!
Coddle my fears!
Or I will go through the garden
chewing off roots for spite.

I will crawl into the rafters
and become a leak dripping on your chest in bed.

I will turn into a cough
you cannot get rid of,
or fog that broods the house.
At night I will take my old form
and steal away to the typewriter
to write damp poems like this one.