to the girl who painted roaches

I never forgot the time you told me

that as a kid you used to paint roaches

with fingernail polish

in a poverty-stricken rez home 

I imagine you alone, wild-haired and dirty

in a house full of drunk adults

it reminded me of my own neglect

it reminds me of what I went without

but how unusual it was for you

to see beyond all of that dirty

and paint a roach so pretty

I imagine your walls 

crawling with little slivers of blues, reds, and greens

scuttering metallic things dashing in and out of everything

catching the moonlight thru a dirty screen

I wish I had known to paint the ugly things 

instead of trying to stomp out and hide 

the poor dullness inside

from the bedbug bites to the head full of lice

I wish I had grown up in a middle-class life

but it wasn't so 

it just wasn't meant to be 

maybe I should paint some roaches

and let them scatter (thru the cracks of my mind)

brings some color to the gray matter

and maybe then I'll be fine