[I press ahead with posting this long dark poem 200 about (literal or metaphorical) poisoning. Here are Sections 3 and 4, which take a somewhat Gothic allegorical turn. Bear with me. I promise it will get more comical in later sections.]

200 Section 3 Newcomer

A flash of electricity in a retort

& I am born lethal from birth,

seep, weeping, from the distillation tube,

over the stained wood of a lab bench

made of felled trees. I spray my first

toxic inspiration of this foul world,

back out into the unmasked faces

of my progenitors. Adopted,

I fall into the arms of nurses

veiled by headscarves and masks:

a well-adapted happy psychopathic child.

200 Section 4 Alma Miasma

The ghost she gave up

is now the guest of her whitened face,

her breath smoke, her make-up

gas mask. Tubes of lips and nose

no longer connect her

to the perfumes and pollen

of the world. Morphine numbs her.

Her last expiration of methane-scented breath

clouds a mirror with germs,

sighing out fecundity, radiance

still in her glassy lifeless eyes.