Cacoethes

I love having— hating the feeling of wanting. Wanting cuts my guts as consequentially as diarrhea. I steal casually, like second breaths after waking, or proper newborns latched onto Mama’s nipple. It is inspired vice. There’s a teaspoonful of buccaneering Barbarossa sprinkled in my lines. I commit careless crimes— not much outside the magpie’s range. I am the cupbearer at Mass now. All men are wanting persistently. Other men’s carelessness is providential, inviting nosy rats to the quiet catwalk. I collect on neglect, underprized nuggets that poke at my wonder, scratching curiosities. I stole wives off petty husbands, decaying cars banked by roadways, the overhanging fruit of fat landlords, words from Webster’s to ennoble intellect, thoughts from tinkers; Christ’s reflection—but the mirror stole it back. Psych docs lower me on leather beds, wanting to safe-crack my mystery. I tell them Barbarossa blood ties tarnish, birth bandits. Shrinkers countdown— ten, nine, eight... I am paroled to a fantasy field of rare, clean earth, of no lack. There is my First mother. She is a beauty queen. Me, unseen. She is careless, drawn by luster. I yell, spoiled apples! Me, unheard. She tastes. She calls my First father to probe the coveted yield. I am bidden too. I eat. Theirs is mine. A primordial gift is constant craving.