Safety Lesson

SAFETY LESSON

by Nisa Malli

(Content Warnings: burning imagery, illness)

The monster is cultivating 
small fires again. It burns
toast, burns skin, burns candles 
to burnt nubs, burns rubber turning 
brute corners, burns bridges
with friends whose names 
it can’t remember. Lacking self-

preservation, it sears 
its palm shaking the hand 
of pot handles, scalds 
its feet in soup, stacks
a carton of eggs on an element
‘til they smoke with a rot it can’t 
remember how to smell. Before 

                              illness your once lover called you
                              a responsible monster, internal alliteration 
                              brightening the tease of being on top
                              of your shit. Her wife called you a Woman

                              of Action, a match stick 
                              between commitment and execution, 
                              out the door before anyone 
                              else found their coat.

                              In illness, you are not any kind
                              of woman or monster—you are a fire 
                              hazard, a perpetual fever, forever 
                              both in and made of danger.