I. vessel of flesh, filled with warm broth floating no up, no down liquid darkness shadowy thuddings organ-rumblings, cryptic gurglings mouth closes on translucent thumb, sucks now within, a pulse thumping in rhythm with the beat of this world discovering legs! kicking, tumbling, spinning pushing out on soft walls feeling them push back -- there is an outside not-me, not-here II. Tonight I found a carrot peel in the drain beneath my bottom. I was trying to find the soap, a slippery sliver of soap darting like a goldfish through my fingers. Dishes can't go in the bathtub, but I can go in the sink -- why? She filled the plastic milk jug and I tilted my head so far back that it hurt my neck and I squeezed shut my eyes and some soapy water trickled down but she dabbed at my eyes with a dishtowel. She found the soap, she rubbed it between her hands and ran her hands down my spine. Her hands traced circles on my shoulder blades, they glided around and down to my belly. III. Negative space traded places with positive, don't ask me to explain unless you've seen it. I had to feed the professor's cats, to bring in the paper and as I walked, my feet moved like they were not mine and my eyes, gloriously, were not mine, as I walked to the house that was not mine to keep it safe -- absurd, to trust me! I laughed at the black mica-studded street and mica-studded sky -- we were within a geode, cracked open by God, everything scintillated -- I used that word, grabbing his hand, pulling him even as I melted, evaporated into the damp August night, pulling him, his hand, for once, colder than mine, leading him under trees like seaweed, undulating, breathing -- I could hear the stomata. He stared at the pattern of tiles as I filled the tub with warm water. I let him sit by the faucet, I was feeling that generous. I felt the water in my every cell thrum in sympathy with the water around me. My fingers unwove his tangles of hair, the roots from beneath the loam, the network of nerve fibers. He touched the nape of my neck and I purred like the cats that I still had to feed. IV. My fingers still search for more hair; they are confounded to suddenly meet air. The plastic curtain hangers clatter like computer keys. The curtain is transparent, with green leaves. I can peek through the jungle into the mirror. Even through the steam I startle myself. I am an otter, sleek and clever. I am sea glass, a bottle broken and mostly smoothed, lustrous, elegant, still sharp enough to slice a careless foot. V. She emerges wet and wrinkled, this person, this daughter, crumpled like the wings of a butterfly when it staggers from its cocoon. I see the cord throbbing. I wince as they cut it; the doctor laughs. VI. I have borne the indignity of lying on display in the living room, alive but silent and unremarked, like an aquarium of slow and common fish. I do not try to speak; words will not come out. I can endure being rolled on one side; I pretend to be a log with damp scuttling life underneath that flees from the light, pillbugs that curl into grey armored balls. I no longer mind the crinkling of plastic as it slides under me, and the zip of adhesive tabs. But when she fills the basin with warm water, warm, soapy water, and dips the sponge, and wrings it out, and begins to wash me - I would rather it be the final scrubbing, the one that I assume I will not notice.