Claire the Poet: To a Pitiful Soul

There’s this Siren you might mistake for the Still Small Voice—

but loud enough, actually, like the alarm you forgot to disable before Saturday morning.

She narrates this tale in which you’re The Last Emperor.

Everyone else shrinks to minutiae. You grow gargantuan. Yes, poor you,

your angst drowns out all Ratio and Proportion.

Don’t even crack the door open to accept her greeting. Don’t entertain her.

First, she’ll hang her hair shirt over your chair, then she wants to bunk with you;

not content with the guest room. She’ll demand the best sheets—the featherbed.

She’ll steal your just desserts. She’ll trash your treasures, send compassion packing.

She chokes your jokes, and lurks in the cupboard to cloudy your thinking.

With a neon Sharpie, she highlights offenses, stores them in scrapbooks.

She rechristens you The Victim. Every slight reckoned.

Soon, you’re jealous of stories sadder than yours. You demand a black armband,

a wheelchair, a glass eye, a eulogy, a clean hanky, a foot in the door—

If you glimpse this harpy behind you, run like Hell opened its exits. Get out now!

Find another dwelling—a foxhole if need be, an orange crate, even a cave.

This public service announcement comes from my watchful heart.

Look out, you, flirting with her in the shadowy alleys, giving her a try.

Look, her lipstick’s already all over your collar.

Claire the Poet