Exquisite me. Angelic me.
I never say I’m sorry for anything
(one of us thinks). I can’t remember
the present, for all the unthinkable
future reversing back into me.
Tentative. Me in suspense.
The art on the walls is hanged
at nefarious angles;
a boy at the counter disappears,
or I can see through him.
How does my x-ray vision
know when to stop? I
was trying to get to the way end.
What are you looking at, dog.
OK, I don’t belong in the park,
with nature: I’m not enough rich,
not enough poor; the fluff from a tree
makes my heart sore. I’m not crazy.
I just prefer the feminine remove
of a reproduction, of a living room—
the miniature texts exquisitely real,
if you had the means to read them.
Tiny poison in the wallpaper
in theory would eventually kill you.
Did you know fruit flies can have sex
for twenty minutes? That’s like half
their lifespan. There’s a couple going at it
on the parquet floor. The future
of the species depends on it. Unless
they’re just writhing in death throes—
hard to tell at this size. Either way
I’m not traumatized.