Self-Portrait as Bust by Molly Rooney (34, Washington)

please tell me what kind of woman 
you are looking for. 
varnish over my body 
in cold storage,
let me suck milk 
from a ribcage.

treading water is fine until 
a bloated pomegranate 
needs tending.
I could grow plump on horse meat
or an allowance of oysters.

my passport is a fetal bull. 
crowning,
I offer you memories of apron, horseradish, 
razor blade,
the price is ambivalent to me.

my name is not an animal’s head,
a cup bearing black tar, 
a harvest of mink stoles.
​
I would be an intimate citizen,
a moonless pursuit, 
an absolute sculpture.

Molly Rooney is originally from upstate New York and now lives in Seattle, Washington. Her work has appeared in Clamor, Hobo Camp Review, and Catamaran Literary Reader.