for Rae Armantrout
THE GIFT
What plods granted
so weak to will
on rooftops, pigeoned
and resting
(this bird is an object)
a stack of white
feathers, now
grayed and gentle
farther up
and down below
the station of
the subway
hides the
other things
the gifts just waiting
to be returned
because they
could never be used.
SUSTAINED
1
Of course
I came
and I’m
glad I did,
that smile of yours
so hard now
to sustain.
2
The first one,
the time and again
of a counted
tomorrow
I hold you tender
and fold you
to look like me.
3
Just so
like glares
in the again
of beginnings
and modesty
on a summer day.
BORDER PERFECTION
1
These things
always rhyme
and it’s a note
to yourself
that the pushing
out of the room
is like a pushing
out of air
these are cycles
when they return
by the hundreds
two if by sea
collected crooks
waiting by the window.
2
The officer
in good cheer
asked me to
open my bag
I didn’t have a thing in it.
He thanked me,
and I nodded
and swiped my card through the turnstile.
THE VESICLE
1
For weeks
it was understood:
The time had come
to reach in and tear it.
The doctors all
washed their hands
and looked solemnly in the mirror.
“We will tear
it out, we will!
and will do it
with such delicate feeling
you will feel nothing,
nothing at all.”
2
Women
talked like this
and squirm
often in front
of the mirror.
The little finger
toying the ear
forging something
like forgiving
like their mothers
taught them to
but that was long ago.
EXACT
Before I see
you naked
tell me how
you like to be looked at.
What do you
think of when
you look at yourself
sunk deep in the bed?
What do you
want from me
when you take
off your clothes?
Do you dream
of wet umbrellas?
or sleeping bowels
of yearning.
*
So many times
these apartments
fill and are
filled alone
the elevator versus
the stairs only
combine to anoint
the choices in life.
WITH
It’s filler
for the late night
and I trace the
redraw for
the rested now
like when I
wake up
and find these
little pipes pipping.
*
I write
because I
can and
can replace
your sentence
here.
*
“With”
is the word
I’m living
without, and it’s
the wrong title now.
