several examinations

i got an x-ray to look for my sadness.
there was no doctor or machine,
just me & a spool of radiation.
found three thumb tacs in my throat
& a migrating bottle cap but nothing else.
i bought a tunnel & a horseshoe 
& a pile of needles. i sold
a trapzee & a goldfish & a fishing rod.
next summer i am determined 
to drown in the ocean by accident
or at least sever a mountain in half.
they'll pull my body from the water
& perform a quick autopsy at which
they'll discover my sex.
i found my happiness in an envelop once.
i laughed so hard it turned into 
a pigeon & ran off. 
i said "please come back."
i'm sick of asking people
"how are you?" because i cannot begin
to begin. in it's place i'm suggesting 
asking, "what is horrifying you lately?"
i'm scared of driving my car
off a cliff but more specifically 
i'm horrified by the length of january. 
how do the pine trees do it? just keep
going & going & going. pressing each day
into a rigid needle. i'm more
of a dogwood. i found paw prints
in the snow & followed them
to a hole in the atmosphere. a little dog
perched there like my own private trinket.
he was scared too. i told him to go & come back
in a few hundred years when i'm no longer
worrying so much.
i'm not losing my mind yet. i'm just
leaving the month out to dry.
if i found it (my sadness) i don't know 
what i would do with it.
do i want it removed? made solid?
made shelve-able? yes. that's it.
i want my sadness made into 
a paper weight so next time the wind
tears a hole in the side of a room
we'll be held in place. then 
heavy as it as, i could at least
wrap a hand around it & say 
"this is where it lives." 
whoever decided sadness is blue
was wrong. sadness for me
is red & then sometimes indigo.
blue is a sleeping color.
it never wakes up. i never wake up.
gulls gather around my bed & say
"it's tomorrow again." i refuse.
next month i'll try again.
use the paperweight to break 
a neighbor-window. crawl inside a new life.
yes. again though, i'm asking the pine trees
"how should i?"