New Year’s Guts
by Kimberly Phillips
I kill myself every year.
It’s an elaborate ritual
of tearing and purging.
Reassembling.
I kill the girl I was
and remake her
into someone she likes better
and I must use every
part of the carcass
to get me through the winter.
So I chew up last year’s
eyes like gum,
break down my old teeth
with harder ones,
translate the braille on my bones
into something prettier,
and make soup with their marrow.
I turn my heart and liver to pȃté,
unravel my brain and hang
it out to dry.
I stuff my body with charcoal
for cleansing.
Steal clear blue doll’s eyes
for seeing, wolf fangs
for biting.
Watch me, bent over,
chewing on my kidneys,
reassembling my ribcage,
a gruesome thing,
creating.
Bleaching the freckles out of my skin,
gutting my uterus,
eating my eggs like caviar.
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