Succubus

I build my walls
With eyeliner and black polish
And dyed-dark hair, rebelliously spiked;
I grid myself with chains for war.

FUCK YOU
With your pretty perfect hair
And your Barbie-doll smiles
And your greasy blue eyes
You cookie-cutter children in your
Little bubble world--

I see your sneers, and smile
In your plastic faces, plastic insults
Hollow, echoing back
Your empty fashion talk
Of boys and girls and gossip--

You talk and talk and talk and
GOD, don't you ever shut up?
--Covering the holes you've carved
Deep within your souls--

How much? How much?
How much do you cost?
Fifty dollars? One hundred?
Or that DARLING skirt from macy's?
When did you sell yourself
To match the illusion
You dreamed in your mirror?

Witch, bitch, I hear
The hate you hurl behind me
And laugh, for I read
Your secret names
Within the words--

For I know, I KNOW
the truth behind your hatred--
I know your secrets, I see the holes
Of your mind, your soul,
Your daily hara-kiri
On the altar of your idols--

And I myself, impenetrable,
Indefinable by your
Polyester standards--
Gnostic turpitude, if you will--

I feel your hatred,
And revel in its warmth.

(Written for a class assignment about teen social structures. For all the sad outcast girls, there's always one misfit that nurses a bitter hatred for the popular girls. I was trying to get some of that burning acid Sylvia Plath gets into her poetry, though I'm nowhere nearly as good as she is. And, well, some of my own thoughts undoubtedly went into this poem. "Gnostic Turpitude"--the crime of being opaque--comes from "An Invitation to a Beheading," the crime for which Cinncinatus C. is convicted. Maybe a bit heavy for this poem, but it popped into my head, and I had to put it in. Yay Nabokov.)