twenty-first

today
is my twenty-first birthday.

some people are asking me
what i want. what do i want?
i say, i don’t want anything.
i make up something
funny to distract them and change the subject.

there are a lot of real
things i could want. like to just
stop watching. i could want my dog back, who
silently listened to everything i ever said
and never spoke a word. i could say i wanted
nothing but for my boy’s chest behind my back
rising and falling rhythmically to the nervous beat
of my heart.

i could say i needed the misty
irish landscape and the friends who came with it
back, or i could remind myself that i don’t
want strangers anymore. then again,
i could say that i want only sex, or money,
or video games, or clothes.

but i don’t want any of that. not really. not at all. i might pretend
that having any one of those things on my birthday
would make me able to stop wondering, stop thinking,
and quell my confusion
for more than just a few weeks or days at a time.

instead, i say nothing. it’s not worth it to explain
how much of something else i really want, especially when i’m certain
i cannot have all of it. i am ashamed
because i want to know, understand,
and possess too many things.
i am selfish and i am jealous.
i’ve been trying to convince
everyone of all of that for
so long now.
why does it surprise you when i am so?
is it because you think
you see glimpses
of another me within?

i haven't had enough to drink yet.

but there are some nights--
with painted nails and pounded piano
--that remind me, and then
i think i see
them, too, sometimes.