to be like a cup is, at peace and beautiful

i would like to be like a cup is,
at peace and beautiful and full of itself

i'm covered in the shed hair of cats
that love me and purr when i stroke them

but the stray orange hair in my tea
makes the cup more like me than i'd like

we are too similar for me to want to be
like the cup filled with tea, hot and bitter

i would not like to be the tea, but the milk
perhaps, that gives the tea a mild natured way

to think of the world in meals and tropes
and i would like to be free from poetry

all the poetry that is better than mine,
and all the poets, better at reading it out

in front of small crowds of wine drinkers
at local bookshops that wave the flag

of denial in the face of a dying way of living
like students with pocket money left over

from dinner last night because the girl they wanted
didn't want to go home with them, with him

i do not want to be like him, i want to be like her
strong willed and pretty and dressed

with small shoes and a book under her pillow
innocent and longing for true love

i don't want to be too pretty, just the right length
like a song in a movie that plays over kissing

the part where the perfect girl
is wearing the perfect dress and sipping

the perfect tea over the perfect conversation
with the perfect college boy

who reads poetry perfectly and then kisses her
when she least expects it

so that finally, she can taste love
without thinking too much about it before it happens

a perfect, pretty couplet
at the end of a perfectly written song.