Please and Amphitheater
The broken speaker stops
the whole room from filling
your miracle machine with paper
phrases. The projector smokes
and throws anthems and
pictograms.
I cannot go on living
like a starfish in the silence
the ocean demands.
I try to imagine what it is like
to look at you that stupid way
you are always practicing
at being involved in a sleep
study.
Rise above the crank camera’s
leaky hotel footage. Breathy and
serene
clean sheet sleeping in the
alarm closet with a spare lamp.
Alone
in the parking garage writing
poetry
that way. When you read
the shower scene with a madras
and
foreign language words in the
first act
and become a jar of rusted
peonies
no one will hardly notice.
The ersatz moon is a simple ridge
of plain newsprint. The coffee is
water. The pauses long
for reprieve or applause. Return to Contents
