Lady Lazarus

I have done it again. 

One year in every ten I manage it— 

 

A sort of walking miracle, my skin 

Bright as a Nazi lampshade, 

My right foot 

 

A paperweight, 

My face a featureless, fine 

Jew linen. 

 

Peel off the napkin 

O my enemy. 

Do I terrify?— 

 

The nose, the eye pits, the full set of teeth? 

The sour breath 

Will vanish in a day. 

 

Soon, soon the flesh 

The grave cave ate will be 

At home on me 

 

And I a smiling woman. 

I am only thirty. 

And like the cat I have nine times to die. 

 

This is Number Three. 

What a trash 

To annihilate each decade. 

 

What a million filaments. 

The peanut-crunching crowd 

Shoves in to see 

 

Them unwrap me hand and foot— 

The big strip tease. 

Gentlemen, ladies 

 

These are my hands 

My knees. 

I may be skin and bone, 

 

Nevertheless, I am the same, identical woman. 

The first time it happened I was ten. 

It was an accident. 

 

The second time I meant 

To last it out and not come back at all. 

I rocked shut 

 

As a seashell. 

They had to call and call 

And pick the worms off me like sticky pearls. 

 

Dying 

Is an art, like everything else. 

I do it exceptionally well. 

 

I do it so it feels like hell. 

I do it so it feels real. 

I guess you could say I've a call. 

 

It's easy enough to do it in a cell. 

It's easy enough to do it and stay put. 

It's the theatrical 

 

Comeback in broad day 

To the same place, the same face, the same brute 

Amused shout: 

 

'A miracle!' 

That knocks me out. 

There is a charge  

For the eyeing of my scars, there is a charge 

For the hearing of my heart— 

It really goes. 

 

And there is a charge, a very large charge 

For a word or a touch 

Or a bit of blood 

 

Or a piece of my hair or my clothes. 

So, so, Herr Doktor. 

So, Herr Enemy. 

 

I am your opus, 

I am your valuable, 

The pure gold baby 

 

That melts to a shriek. 

I turn and burn. 

Do not think I underestimate your great concern. 

 

Ash, ash— 

You poke and stir. 

Flesh, bone, there is nothing there-- 

 

A cake of soap, 

A wedding ring, 

A gold filling. 

 

Herr God, Herr Lucifer 

Beware 

Beware. 

 

Out of the ash 

I rise with my red hair 

And I eat men like air. 

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