I am 23.
The odd-number age tag
gave me some odd habits.
But now I am more than ready.

For instance,
I pop open my anti-fungal drop
mini bottle
like champagne,
invited into the afterparty
at play.

I boil water
and fill my Eiffel Tower-engraved ceramic mug.
Fifteen milliliters, no more,
otherwise, I will brim my cells
with a medicated overdose.
It’s like permitting the drops
to river-raft
through my RBCs,
already making my bloodstream hallucinate.

The water seems irascible,
angry to the bottom,
hungry to perform osmosis,
to absorb ingredients.

I bow to its appetite.
Squeeze.
My anti-fungal drop ripples magenta,
a half-minute dance
dissolving to burgundy.
Zincum Metallicum,
Tellurium,
Sulfur iodatum
a wild composition,
the choreographer of this dance.

I know them,
having tried the character assassination
of this homeopathic concoction
my mother believed in it
like a magic potion.

In the end,
my skin burning and red
already made it mine.
It’s not my world, but an estate
I must visit often.

Now, like a
well-behaved, money-conscious
child of a middle-class family,
I have to finish it
before March 2025:
its so-called expiry date.

"Shake well before use," it says.
Am I to perform hip-hop
with the bottle in hand?
Order a hula hoop
with my birthday voucher
and twirl my waist?
Ask a circus clown
to let me jump through a fire ring
while I deal with the lion I am unemployed,
in this poverty-ridden, jungle-less world?
Or perhaps
drop the bottle in the washing machine,
instead of Surf Excel or Tide,
and let it swirl in a whirlpool of artificial chaos?

Then it demands,
to be stored in a cool, dry place.
Should I trek to the mountains,
and battle a bear for its den?
Sneak it into a hospital morgue
while my friend gets his MRI?
Or leave it with lovers,
whose cold emotions and dry romance
might match its vibe?

I think I should just
mail my queries to customer care.

.    .    .