Skin off my lips

I peel the skin off my lips
When I'm nervous
Or stressed, or upset,

my nails grab edges and pull off dry skin, bleeding and exposing freshness within
I'm not sure why it keeps me calm,

A certain kind of control, I make it, I break it, I own it, I dispose it. I use it and I abuse it.

I kissed a boy, and now I scrape my lips. Remove him, destroy him. I don't want to retain or maintain him. He means nothing to me.

Peel off the skin, layer by layer, making holes in my kisses.

I go and kiss more boys,

It's only skin off my lips

Funerals

“Coffins. Who’d of thought it? Catalogues for coffins. And the speed and efficient nature of funerals in general. I mean I know we’ve been doing them for years, but we’re very good at it aren’t we?”

Everyone laughed.

“No, but really the whole thing has just been one task after the other, call the funeral home, call the hospital, call the crematorium, call the family, call the papers, call the lawyers.” She paused, “I’d half-forgotten someone had died!”

Everyone laughed.

“And the things that always seemed like jokes – he always said he thought he should hedge his bets with the man upstairs just in case the religious folks got it right, but was that serious?”

Everyone laughed.

“And the funeral director, oh the funeral director trying to tactfully ask if he was a fat man, by asking if we needed one urn or two.”

Everyone laughed.

“I mean the whole thing is just too funny.”

At the funeral everyone cried.