The Weight of the Month

I wrote a dentist appointment in red

right over the top of a birthday in blue.

There isn't enough white space for the dead

or the living or the things I’m supposed to do.

The ink bled through to the next thirty days,

a dark, jagged bruise on the flip of the page.

I’m lost in a messy, chronological maze

where every square inch is a different cage.

I stare at the grid until the numbers blur

into a pile of tasks that I’ll probably miss.

I used to be someone who knew where they were,

not a person who lived in a margin like this.