how to make someone like you

me and all my glory

what is that wet thing
seeping out of me
when no one is touching me
in the place I am seeping out of

the cave
is where they put
loud women
to keep quiet

but I am not a woman

I am blood once a month

I am oil
rosebud
soil
dirt
and scum
but mostly rosebud

I am spread open
on granite countertops
in the afternoon
of an affair
that happened to me
in a dream
that happened to me

I never happen to just be dripping
in the middle of the night
but if you hear raindrops at your window
I swear it’s me

I never happen
to anyone
very much
at all

for more than a night
and five hundred
and thirty something days

will you pass the salt
and help me decay