Someone else died hauling
slabs of stone for the castle walls
or catered Hitler’s dinner parties.
You didn’t starve in a potato famine.
Or scrub the shitty chamber pot
of a dignitary’s mistress.
No. Though you might’ve
been that mistress. And not
some throw-away type dame—
no, you were scandalous,
a front-page vamp who exposed
the treasonous scheme
he boasted after a lustful romp.
Exhausting really. That’s why
your psychic says you suffer
from anemia this go-around. Why
you can’t keep from shuddering
in a camera’s flash. The result
of too much unwanted attention
last life. Surely, that’s why
this one’s so quiet, uneventful,
plain work-a-day. Doesn’t
the soul need a breather
like a faded celebrity
when asked on talk shows
about upcoming projects:
Oh, please—I can’t even,
I’m on hiatus right now.
