My friends live in gaps between the wardrobe and the wall
that are impossible to reach,
as I stretch my arms, a web of silence
enters my mouth; they are the shady silence of plaster.
I tell her: choose a picture frame
and stick your scalp through its hollow body,
push the supple roots of hair untouched by sun,
sprinkled with flour,

sneak out of his kitchen or jump through the window
from the tenth floor, you'll land on the atoms of possibilities
like the ashen flowers in the district park.

Your eyes: symbols for bursting, heavy breasts,
sagging from your father's eyes, from equine milk, and presents
that shed from your skin instead of your husband's cruel lips.

His words gather in your bellybutton,
and crawl to your neck, like cypresses in the cemetery,
and suddenly, instead of dust, it is you hanging from the chandelier.

My friends are mine because they are no one’s,
they only listen to themselves and touch only themselves,
my friend is the table leg
whose splinter pierces your thumb while moving house.

My friend: a small plastic ball
filled with brown fluid

My friend is a curly hair
in the drain of her throat

He tells her: together we drew boundaries
to clean furniture together
She tells him: it's easy to fall apart, it's hard
to pierce a pea with your fork

My friends are the first sorrows
whom I genuinely loved

They are the first to make decisions
and the only ones to carry them through

My friends are tall buildings
whose hands hold the foundations

My friends are an airplane
with concrete legs