The Suicide Queen
(In the style of Maralyn Lois Polak’s The Tragedy Queen)
Epigram-Ain’t no victims, only volunteers-Richard Tubbs of
“Miami Vice”
-
The suicide queen
has another new lover
she tells me alllll about him
his strengths, his insights,
his art, his work,
and every other meandering thing,
but the size of his underwear.
And he makes her strong
he makes her strong
but when he leaves
when he leaves
there’s nothing left
but the morning
but the mourning
she eyes the knife
and calls me a gain.
-
The suicide queen
has always been in therapy.
Now,
she is getting better,
no more ledges.
They give her those pills weekly
and she thinks
she might be able to work
in a year or two,
though she’s never worked
more than three months at any one job
since she’s been a visitor on this planet
and if she could have $5.00
it will surely be enough
un til her
next
monthly
check.
-
The suicide queen
has found a new religion
outer peace
inner thin.
She is now a whole person,
tranquil and calm,
able to deal with all the twists and turns of life,
as long as she
never
leaves
her
house.
4)The suicide queen
has stopped drinking
drugs
and men
and wo men
she will now devote
therestofherlife
to her art,
none of which
she has ever sold,
none of which
anyone understands,
for there is nothing to understand
(but we love the suicide queen.
We tell her it’s wonderful.).
Later that night,
we meet at the same bar,
and she asks
me
where
her new joy friend
and her
can cop like some
heavy
weed
man.
I buy her a glass of wine
and go back
to looking out windows,
where there are truly
only
walls.
5)-The suicide queen
feels old one
day, noone
seems to care,
anymore, that
sensitive she
needs help
needs friends
needs support.
Seeking a re-affirmation
of her current market worth,
she takes her week’s supply
of pretty pink pills,
brings out the bourbon,
and gets on the horn.
One hundred and twenty seven phone calls later,
she gets to me.
I promise to come.
6) I am so tired
of all male and fe male and im paled suicide queens,
I cannot go
to one more
need
a
gain.
One would hope,
then,
she’s merely
still
waiting.
10/30/85 then revised 6-29-86