Mirage
The slow and near-fire
epoxy of the night
has cured to a mirror
of precocious sun.
On tilt the lit surface
draws sharp, flared
routes, tremors of industry
-misshapen blocks
and their flowers sealed
to the creek. Risk dulls
in the walk, the prolonged
imminence; naloxone
under its zipper, soft sky.
A reluctant meditation
Aisatsana masks
the birds; I resist the earth.picture water or it will happen, the opposite
of a string
no string
or a sheet
cast loosely
on discrete parts
of nature
a camcorder
or nothing ever
or blue replacing
amber in the fast
far lights
of a highway
a forest with
no people
or accidents
of timing or
of negligence
an overengineering
of the heart
where I grew
what made
my steady snare
of rulesObject of none
I’m better
than a sorry feeling
feel nothing for me
leave some bed
for the patient queue
and don’t lean
on courtesy the way
one does pride.
don’t protect me
or anyone toward
which you feel
the drive, not
the chirpy mechanic,
not the deep-voweled
waitress or the nurse
who does graveyard,
not the GP whose practice
sunset its kids,
whose walls hold
all the handprints,
still, acrylic splashes
of contracts much briefer
than those envisaged
at the opening reception—
we’ll grow up with you
brochures promised
or threatened in the way
of seasons who
in all but name risk
burrowing into
some looming
existential upshot,
teasing it in habit.
I want to be
one of those
women. at lake compounce
I was six
waiting to float
on the curlicues of its lazy river
twelve
tossed on its man-made waves
losing the floorheartland blues
america is wide
and voluptuous
we used to visit
the magic middle
stuffed in the vhs
player. laura ingalls
was her name
and she melted
or she burned;
I don’t recall
an exact equation
a disfigured face
or the force
with which
the oven ejected
my hand
last I looked.
things are
smaller now
anyways.
we’re more like
each other,
cooled.
Lovely.