Dawn McGuire




Absolutely

There will be troubles. 
Night will stay night. 
At first you’ll be dramatic 
and pick a fight. 
Your amygdala won’t listen.                                
Your blood will acidify. 
Gravity will call and your 
cell phone will fall in the toilet. 
                      You’ll take your troubles
to a shrink who’ll recommend 
a cruise and you'll sail to Bimini 
and get giardia which the ship's doc 
will diagnose from across the room 
as you burp up sulfur.

Home, your bedroom ceiling will leak,
roof rats will chew your sleep. 
You'll try to leverage insomnia
and write about the troubles. 
You'll hear a fledgling bird smack
the window pane and you’ll startle
out of your chair and drop the laptop 
and won't even care. 
                      There will be troubles 
and you won't care and that's
the trouble your shrink will say
as you write your last anhedonic 
check. You won't bother 
to add memo line 

fuck you. You're still belching hell 
and swallowing flagyl. 
You're still the four-year-old 
with a plate of fudge for dinner. 
It’s 2 a.m. and she's watching Frankenstein 
reruns again. Not because Boris Karloff 
is like the father she never had 
but like her father. 									

                      He has troubles 
everyone says. His rough hands 
crush the black-eyed-Susan’s he rips 
out of the ground for her. Which tonight 
reminds her with absolute certainty
she has been loved. Is absolutely safe.