ice cream truck

i bite down on my scoop of the ice caps.
no one is saying there isn't a glacier
that looks like your father.
i had a yard sale to sell my decades.
a man with a trunk full of pineapples 
buys my 20s & runs away with them.
maybe if i was a girl my days 
might include more sighing & windows.
there are people in my life who still pretend
i'm a girl. they pick at my hair 
using chopsticks the wrong way. 
i'm often standing in front 
of an open fridge door eating my "dinner"
& "relaxing." i love how quotation marks
turn a word into a question.
what do you mean you're in love with me?
don't you see i'm on fire? do you want
to be on fire too? i remember standing
& watching the house of bronze burn down.
how i felt like my life was becoming a pebble.
the good thing is i'm easy to pick up.
in our neighborhood now 
there's an ice cream truck who drives himself.
little kid fingers reaching for a bite.
i do not believe in stranger danger anymore.
those who said they loved me the most
were the ones who took from me.
bottle caps & a bloodied nose.
a voice that said, "i didn't hit you, do you
hear me?" the ice cream truck is
a place i live. figure eights & flights.
a trunk full of skulls. would you like a taste
of something sweet? would you like
to spend the night with the stained glass sun.
i am sweating lemonade. i am jumping rope
inside my heart. let's not pretend 
the melting doesn't have consequences.
i feel like a girl standing in my driveway.
i hold an ice cream cone & someone 
is telling me, "you can't eat that yet."
cream down my wrist & elbow. i'm begging.