I am not a guide
for every traveler
of loss.

It is the 70s. 1970s? 2570s? Who knows?
Audre and I have a penthouse in New York.

a folksome, gruesome opera
of gauze and malcontent.

We stop doing dishes while
a mile unwinds
from the tree outside.

you quit wearing pants
loaf around your yard
in hole-nipped panties

Winter sat like a wolf
on the horizon.

I have an axe
with hearts gashed

I have observed, the theorist
I am

Ma wrings
a wet world
of colors

I tap at the alphabet while a single deer
taps at the dirt beyond the brush
on the far side of the tree line.

how does an afternoon turn
on its axis?

The storm passes without snow.
The car waits loyally in the back lot.

and then her eyes fully opened — blazed through with strands of mud

here is the sky in stop motion, flickering,
a still shot in monochrome

Should have found a job by now; should have slept in the night;
should have boiled old coffee before noon.