Loving a woman a thousand miles away is entirely pure,
a double vodka minutes before the hypnotic peace of sleep.
I was sitting on a black couch in a foul mood,
looking out the window of my apartment
at the snow-covered roof of the next visible building.
A squirrel leaps across three icy oak branches,
lands on the gutter and turns toward me.
It is fat from a summer that threatened at infinity
and probably has never before seen the frozen world-
the trees and sidewalks and ever-fatal automobiles all dusted white.
My stomach growls. There is food in the cupboards but I have not eaten.
Always memories or fabrications from childhood tap, pesteringly, on glass.
Maybe I should reach out with a bullet, or a hammer like a bearded god,
but Joni Mitchell's "Blue" is on the record player
and winter is no time for slaughter, even of one so small:
there is no water to wash away the red-cheeked shame that hot knives will bring,
only the crystals, unique and dying; an iron spray of tears that long to turn to stone.
No comments:
Post a Comment