Pickles For Breakfast Poem by Rachael Swiss

the white wedding dress
would have suited her better
had it been a straitjacket
fresh off a cold corpse
in a ward full of live wires.

she exfoliates twice daily
and her skin looks better.
first, the cat licks her toes,
then he licks her face
tries to scrub out the daydreams
from her clouded eyeballs
clean with his abrasive tongue
so she may see the world
from a fresh perspective
in the mornings.

whence she wakes up
eats a pickle from the jar
and proceeds to pee.
she thinks better
when she is urinating.

she wants the husband
but not the dress
she wants her skin
to glow for him
without these defiled methods.
she should stop eating
pickles for breakfast.