Lani Scozzari

ADDICTION

I.

All I believe is beauty,
whittled, terrible.
Your name rips the sky from my life.
I feed you
my hot marrow, slanted.
I arch for you
when you ask. Shrunken, my breasts
like a surface of tar. I always knew
you.
Your grip carves the arctic
of my hand. I’ve weather
water’s edge for you.

II.

I will dance with no pulse.

III.

It’s you—
you are the one
responsible
for my slow motion panic. You—
the one who scars
my throat. You—
the slow sliver of snow
across my burnt lip.

IV.

A thousand birds’
wings tremble. I am splintered like a child
only capable of need. You are like a bad mother:
Throw up…Throw up
Your small black pistol,
callous and cold. The fry
in too hot oil, what could have fed me—?

In this beam of light,
I surrender
again.
Discover myself swept and begging
for bread.

V.

You are the untold version of me,
a hole with no rim.
Who I am
with you is more than I have been
with anyone.

VI.

You hug me, long—
smell of metal, wipe the bile from my lips.
I crawl into your chest, so small, sweaty
and wretched. I know what is coming…I know what is coming—
The slow ease of tide rises
around me like a dream. You tell me, You are safe with me.
I am safe with you.
I am safe with you
Safe
as the drift of icebergs, not really white but blue
frozen and solid so.

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Lani Scozzari is a graduate of Emerson College and holds an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College. There she served as Senior Editor of Lumina. She is a recipient of a Key West Literary Seminar Scholarship as well as a finalist award from The Massachusetts Cultural Council. Recent publications include Comstock Review, Midway Journal, DeComp Magazine, Whistling Fire, Mom Egg and Saw Palm.