Pica
--For a woman who found divorce papers on her kitchen counter today

I eat rock--
rolling gravel
against my jaws,
teeth ground
to sand and bone.
I swallow an ashtray--
in the pinking empty
cavern of my mouth
cinders cling
to the vaulting.
I light matches
on my tongue--
potassium chlorate
and sulfur make the
blue, hot exhale.
I devour pencils--
gnawing the wood
with incisors of iron
and wearing the graphite
in a sloppy ring
around my mouth.
I chew paper--
savoring the dry
of the pulp
and glue
and rags
that held the
world together.


Meghan Mullaney