Paper
written by: Yves K. Morrow
I am paper
in the hands of a child.
You touch me
carelessly.
Your eager fingers
smudge my skin
until all that is left
is a window of a woman,
a tragic sliver of white
in an ever darkening room.
I thin beneath
your constant erasure.
What I was
and what I am
interchangeable
and imperfect.
My needs are
inconsequential,
my nerves naked,
my heart fuzzy and grey.
I am merely a product
for your amusement.
You do not care,
you only do
that which comes easiest
to you.
As I lie here exposed
I wonder if my pain
is in anyway
a reflection of the artist
or if the artist
is simply thoughtless.
You leave uncertain marks.
Marks which tear
at my insides.
Marks which lie
scar-adjacent.
The stars weep
and you laugh
as I,
crowded and remade
a thousand times,
become a void.
You scribble
in my margins,
your shapeless sentiments,
your waxy, wavering lines
untranslatable,
sometimes offensive.
You tear my edges
and crush me
into a ball
with your fist.
I am only a draft.
You will never
carry me to the end.
I will not become
a memory for you.
I am nothing precious.
In me there is only
the notion of a life.
