ONE by Carolyn Rodgers.

People die from loneliness.
Life becomes an incurable disease,
a job, an excuse-an operation
of sloppy dissections.

There is a constipation of the
heart, a diarrhea of need. Be-
ing is instinct, the body a
machine-the mind a lever or

the body the lever, the mind the
machine; in either case, operating
and driving on. And skin tightening
up bone until you mouth at the misery

and bargain with the ache. This is
not to say I am giving up, even
though life has pumped me up with
the pain. The rules are the
I am the stray one…

From Paper Soul, copyright 1968 by Third World Press.