from spending too much time in white
space which alternates between cradling
me and squeezing my guts out and some
time ago, I reached back and felt them
there, blinking under my dark ponytail.
When I don’t use them, they crust with
lymph and old skin. I have to rub
to coax them out of my tendons, knotted
and taut. Open, my eyes all itch as though
the air around me is forever spiked with
goldenrod, and for this reason, I cannot
process comfort: a place where my odd body
ends and the world begins. Eyes three and
four don’t react much to light, but they water
in lust, squint at intimacy, bulge at rejection.
They narrow each time that someone deems
me an alien. A problem. An anomaly. A bitch.
In white space, my body shrinks because I
can never extend my limbs to fit the shape
assigned to me. I wish that all four eyes
had powers like heirloom amulets: two
lookouts always on high alert for temptation
and fraud, and two to guide me from niche
to temporary niche until the day comes that
space has been made for my odd brown body
so that I can rest all four eyes and expand to fill
my space. Sometimes I profit from my many
eyes, however swollen, however sore. In white
space, people line up to gawk at the back
of my neck. They nod together to appreciate
my vitriol and scorn. They buy my books, then
pull me from any niche I try to claim as mine.
