the "madwoman"

19 and just off
an overdose of sleeping pills,
watching odd-ball comedies
slightly chubby and scantily clad
on a spartan sofa
in a white hotel
for the scrambled...
where a pen is a self-harm weapon

her spirits are good
and she talks with a tripping tongue
about painting and the guitar,
brushing back her blonde Helena curls
mania flashing in her laughing eyes

she has the dark gift
just starting life really
(dew glistening pink rosebud)
so many discoveries and choices
ahead of her...
she may become an artist,
a lover, a mother or all...
a con-woman or a saint
preserved in symphony or paint
or dead and forgotten
young in a truck-stop motel room
or old behind a picket fence

In the meantime,
we eat well, smoke cigarettes,
and do the strange, strained dance
of transient friendship
native to such institutional isles