Chiggers drink my skin with little straws,
leaving bubbles that knock me hard awake
at night & calamine my one dim moon.
I learn they are not sipping but injecting,
administering substances into the soft top
of my foot then nibbling the changed part.
Apparently, difference is what they want
to taste; taste now, then never again. Once
they’re nymphs, my skin will be brick wall
to them. No appeal. Meanwhile, the dog toys
are in Ziplocks in the freezer – that squishy seal
with opaque black plastic eyes & a secret
pouch for treats. For peace of mind, I take
my bedding to the laundromat, where
a red-haired woman in a medical boot
calmly reads Jurassic Park: An Adventure
65 Million Years in the Making. My iced rose
hibiscus tea can’t convince me to pretend
my feet are healed. I meet an autopsy
tech on Hinge, wear thick white socks the first
three times we fuck. He never asks. Over early
harvest salads, he remembers the afternoon’s
cadaver, so young, her IUD still in. Chewing
a huge mouthful of raw purple cabbage,
I sneeze & lavender flecks my glasses, a fibrous
strip embracing the acetate nose bridge
like those slap bracelets we used to get
at field day, their curved heads stamped
with the face of an owl or a frog. They stung
when you put them on, the forearm hairs
resisting as you measured the overlap
against your friends to see who had thin wrists.
We do disgust ourselves. There is no appeal
to nature. I banish pests, but know I will
become one, latching on to those
who owe me love, until my life
releases me from need. The lotions to which
I turn tonight are the ones I’ll use to feed
me comfort at the very, very end.

Hibiscus LaCroix lie flat in our mouths,
Confederate dead lie flat in your patches at Thornrose,
the landscapers done for the day, and the laminate
hexagons – brick, wheat, ore, wood & sheep – you lie flat too,
inviting settlement. Married friends from over the mountain,

come for Catan at my dining room table. Oily
Styrofoam take-out containers stained ochre lie flat
on the stovetop specked with Basmati; you dice land flat,
or we’ll roll you again. Two plus eight makes
ten, but who picks up on ten? Makeshift fence

made of zip ties lie flat on your side in the yard with
thin spears of grass threading through, so the dogs need
a leash when they pee between games. Some dudes who are clearly
unwell scream “betrayal” and “fuck” in the lot two doors down,
then drive away fast; we reach for a BBQ chip from Food Lion,

turn up the Bluetooth, drown out the penitent roar of five
dissertations, the silkier wood of the tiny blue houses,
the coarser-grained red houses, smoothing our fingers; we lay
you in patterns all over the table; it’s somebody’s turn – it’s
mine. I settled this tiny far town for the rent & lie

flat on my bed when they’re gone, call the free talk-now
therapy line where a kind voice says “Breathe, there are
lots of great men” – my phone lies flat on the comforter when
the salmon-pink glow of a Tinder match tinkles & settles
my spirit. A welder. Awake, I pray for the power to bend.