MY SHADOW

I am not bragging, 

but the self-thrashing 

exercise 

which I still find 

the easiest 

is

staggering west 

beneath sun around 

noon, because 

no one 

around me is 

likely to notice

how huge 

and how ponderous 

the burden of sin 

I've always been 

dragging behind me

has grown since 

the last time I 

managed to 

run across my own grinning 

skinny black 

corpse in the 

road—but ignore him.

MANIC MANEUVERS

I woke this morning groggy 

but surprised at having, 

sometime in the night, opened up 

an old cut on my pinky. 

Small dribbles of dried blood 

smeared my cheek and pillow case, 

made uncomfortably sticky my sheets and bare 

chest, even my hair and underwear. 

What sort of ungainly 

or manic maneuvers 

had my unsupervised body 

undertaken? I wondered. 

As I began to run the shower, 

I shuddered to think, while I sleep, 

of all the unpopular places 

my unpoliced, renegade 

fingers must travel—

all the old faces, the awkward, 

sentimental, silent embraces 

these foolish hands must 

dare to reach out for, 

which, upon waking, 

I'm certain they'd never 

wish to be caught dead holding.

SPECTRA

Greedy for pastimes

and clicking through all of the options online,

I'm wondering—where do I fit

on this spectrum?

We like tell ourselves life is long. 

But really, desire is so much longer.

So many days, I have sat quiet and still 

as an idling car, helplessly watching 

its frightful tail of quaking black boxcars 

thunder through the crossing.

But it's no use wondering 

when I might be free 

to unite with that dream 

in the vanishing distance.

Every morning, I have one motivation,

and by evening, quite another;

and I've never once gone to sleep wishing for 

the same virgin soul with which I wake.

NO OCCASION

All my life, I've made things 

for no occasion, 

without giving a bird or bush 

for their practical use.

Thinking back on it, 

so much abstract ideation 

sounds perverse.

Has any one particular poem, 

one song, one sentence, 

or one verse

ever really improved the world?—

as opposed to 

merely improving 

a few of their perceptions—

say, for instance the color 

or cultural-historical significance 

of the flower 

they were holding 

out to that world in question?

But now, I'm confused;

for it sounds, 

in my recollection, as if

even the most ambiguous 

or off-season of these symbols

has shown 

how there's really no difference 

of substance

between the two.

THIS IS NOT THE LIFE YOU CHOSE

Outside, it is raining. 

It isn't yet evening; 

but to you, the hour feels thick

and inevitable, like evening.

Weren't you going to leave the house?

Groceries. Good bread and soup

aren't just going to show up—

at least, not nearly 

quickly enough—so 

as always, sooner rather than later, 

you will have to choose.

Dryness. 

Satiety. 

Two forms of comfort.

By pining 

over either, already you realize 

you are losing the crux 

of them both.

IN THE END

What if you saw your most 

difficult choices 

packed like pickles in a cloudy jar? 

Slimy, wart-pocked, shriveled by salt-brine, 

they too have not seen the light 

of the sun for a long time. 

See how you almost pity these catastrophes, 

now that they appear weightless 

and harmlessly sour, now 

that they no longer remind you 

of who you are? 

Notice your mouth even start to water a bit

as you consider their time-accrued flavor—

balanced up tight against 

savory meat and sweet carbohydrate,

and no more harmful to you at this point

than a little too much garlic 

on this last summer night.

PERFECTLY AT HOME

Waking up cold 

and alone in the morning

to the rumble of trash trucks

as they belch and clamor 

their way through the 

too-skinny alley,

I keep my eyes closed 

and feel, for a moment, as

perfectly at home 

as a mirror does 

while it's hanging 

in front of no one.