A poem is a clothesline—
full of words washed clean
and hung up to dry
in the cool breeze
of forgetful eternities
and the antibacterial
gaze of virgin sun—
clean of those old usages
circulating for years,
clean of the stains
of school and work
and church—
exotic and bohemian sizes
billowing back and forth
of familiarly styled signifiers,
some nearly shapeless
from the stretching
of centuries, others seemingly
never even worn before—
and some invisible
thread of love, spiked
here and there
with the stiff pins of longing,
holding the whole
gently swaying
apparatus together—an eerie curiosity
to find while walking
past a haunted house's backyard.
