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How much can it hurt?
The woman at the checkstand
Who wishes you cancer
The fat man who hates his mother
The doctor who forgets
The soup bubbling on the back of the stove
The stone staring into the sun
The girl who kisses her own arms
The girl who fries her hair
The egg turning brown under the spoon
The lemon laughing all night long
My brother in his uniform over Dresden
The single thrill of fire going for the bed
The kindergarten blowing its windows out
Chalk burning the little fingers
The newspaper waiting all weekend
Dosing in rain with the deaths smeared on its lips
The oiling and loading and the springing
The bullets sucking quietly in their cradles
How much can it hurt in the wood
In the long nerve of lead, in the fattened head
How much can it hurt
In each ration of meat hooked and hanging
In the unfinished letter, the dried opened socket
The veil of skin flapping, the star falling
My face punctured with glass
The teeth eating themselves in dreams
Our blood refusing to breathe, refusing to sleep
Asking the wounded moon
Asking the pillow, asking, asking
How much can it hurt?
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