Britney

When the abjection comes on I become a still of childhood laughter, small barbed baby teeth in a negative film roll. There is no power like my addle power. It pushes me into the woods, timberland in my mind’s recess: I cackle in the bramble bush, I cackle in the bramble bush, I crackle in the bramble bush—

—and when I crawl out and reset my neck, and dust off the white prairie nightgown that Toni gave me I am beyond alive. Laid out in front of me in the forest’s designated heart is the ditch where I will be. I am only allowed a few moments with it, the way it is when God invites souls up for a brief talk in the light, and then I am moved along to the wolves’ arena. This is where I lose myself. Being prey is the most effortless. I’ve never understood why people don’t do it more often. I am the most genuine and content when they leave me as a pile of locks and cotton scraps. It is a good way to be.

I exit on the river, happy that it isn’t Lethe. I want to remember. I want to believe. ♦