Two Years, Still Undiagnosed
By. Lori Noto
Who am I to you?
Today,
I am 2:33 PM on the second
Tuesday of July, shuffled out
office doors by 2:49.
Soon, my name will be smoke
vanishing over dinner with your family.
How I wish I could still eat
like I did when I thought
my life meant something.
My flesh has become paper thin, folded
into books on your shelf
until the spines split.
Do you know this body like I know
when my burning throat
screams for honey
like I know I ache from serpents
squeezing my bones
like I know there is an animal,
caged and bleating,
within me?
Hear it.
Hear it.
Heat it. God,
why aren’t you listening?
Lori Noto is a Midwestern poet and proponent of education. A disillusioned business major, she began studying English Education at a small, but adorable, Wisconsin college in 2016. She has not looked back since. Her work is also published in The Sheepshead Review, Cathexis Northwest, High Shelf Press, Coffin Bell, other issues of For Women Who Roar, and Burnt Pine.