#chen.txt

I am a poet. I am flesh powered by electricity and the breaking down of certain materials through heat and acid and other processes. I am a delicious buffet to mosquitoes. I am a strange, ginormous creature to my tiny pets. I, an animal, keep other, smaller animals inside a pen so that I may enjoy their company. I am also unable to touch these smaller animals or spend too much time around them, or my throat, eyes, and nose will start revolting against me, and breathing will become difficult. This is a common problem that runs in my family, and yet we keep these smaller animals anyway.

I did not sleep yesterday night; I did not lie down in the dark and quiet for several hours as a slab of meat in a cage in my head periodically conjured up nonsensical visions. It's suspected I have a condition in which, at random points during this period of lying down in the dark and quiet for several hours, my lungs stop doing their job, and the slab of meat in the cage in my head has to wake me up so they get back on the clock and my temporary rest does not become a permanent one. I do not always remember this when it happens, just like I do not always remember the nonsensical visions I see at night. Or day. Or whenever I rest in this manner. Yesterday I did not rest in this manner and instead watched as an indigo-black sky became gray and then blue.

I once used fine fibers from plants – strung through metal smithed and sharpened – to repair a soft visage of a creature from the masses of saltwater that cover most of our planet. I pride myself on my ability to do this well, and to leave little evidence behind that any repairs were needed in the first place. And yet, when it comes to taking that same metal and simply stabbing it in a certain point on a canvas of fabric held in place, so that my fine rope of fibers may slowly create an image to be admired, I struggle. I struggle like I struggle to remember if I have given my flesh prison the sustenance and nutrients it needs to work and move. I struggle like I struggle to lie down in the dark and quiet for several hours.

Perhaps later today I will slather goo on the remaining evidence that I am but a buffet for mosquitoes, in order to not be slowly tortured by them and my body's revolt against me (because of course, revolting against me due to being in the presence of smaller animals for too long is not enough – no, my flesh prison must also be especially weak to the spit these bloodsuckers leave behind when they are finished feasting). If I do, I will do it while talking to the beings who share my life, flesh prison, and slab of meat in the cage in my head, all as we struggle to remember whether or not we have given our flesh prison its daily vitamins.