Qual o significado de "but i wore very close very close to the bone" nesse poema?

That summer I did not go crazy,

Spoke instead to my mama who insisted

Our people do not go crazy.

We make instead that sudden evening

Silence that follows the shotgun blast.

We stand up alone twenty years after

Like a scarecrow in a field

Pie-eyed, toothless, naming

Our enemies and outliving them.

That summer I talked to death

Like an old friend, a husky voice

Whispering up from my cunt, echoing

Around my knees, laughing.

That summer I did not go crazy

But I wore

very close

Very close

to the bone.