Are you still watching?

Are you still watching?

I drink escape from a teacup. Sip tentatively, still burning my tongue from impatience, putting the kettle on from muscle memory, yes, just one in the morning and one in the afternoon and one in the evening and one and one and and my watch has slithered off my wrist and melted into my cup and my eyes have turned to steam coiling lazy circles above my head and my fingers have turned to hollow porcelain, clinking against each other, lukewarm tea spills from the place my eyes used to be, evaporates from my skin before I know it’s there, is this not its own death, is this not its own sleep, leached of dreams, is this not the easiest way to leave this body without killing it?

p. 25

iAM POETRY 2020