i, the manor girl, the spoiled girl
touched a finger dipped in sweet-milk
to the edges of the lower windowsill this morning
and found them to be lined
with dusty spider husks
just as dirty, just as filthy
as i had cared to imagine

i kept a hand on the banisters of soaring ivory
guarding the grand staircase carved
from the flesh of ancients, life long extinguished
voices silenced, even in death, so that
when my silk slippers stepped
lightly
onto the landing
no one dared to groan in misery
bearing the weight in hunched backs and worn
spines, however light i may be

careful streets shifted under our elegant carriages, muttering
quietly — whispers crushed under gilded silver wheels
and the clip-clop of plumed horses
i am a ghost, shielded from the world by
veils of gossamer finery and the faint glow
of a handcrafted antique lantern
this disguise works both ways

my days are spent reading stories and
dreaming up fantasy lands
not of those with dying candles, sputtering matches
whose hands are cracked and browned —
because living in a false palace, spiraling
far into the sky with alabaster walls
is better than staring out the upper windows
at the gray, coal-coated bricks and alleys
choked with the smog of reality

privilege is too quiet
too polite to make a sound, perhaps
in fear of removing the shroud and
revealing the bones underneath
it is the silence that destroys
because if it were to leave we might not
notice we were in trouble until
we were stranded in the whir and click and
endless buzzing of isolated
independence

i wish i were a necromancer
like the wizards in the storybooks
so i could bring that flight of stairs back to life
hear the timbre of their words
but i descend only on their skeletal vertebrae
it is only the difference of a set of stairs
yet already, down below the clouds,
the sugar dreams of three-course meals, readily delivered,
dissolve away
and instead, there is only
the kitchen, tiled in shadow

i test the knife in my hand, it is strangely heavy
bring it to the tomato, lying on the board
i slice it open — along with my palm, but
as the blood beads up and drips
down, mixing with tomato juice
the pain is loud and real
it is a good reminder

so i sprinkle some sugar over it
and eat it with a fork