that i eat birds/
and even dreamed last night/ I had coughed the feathers up/ at the breakfast table/and Ella said/ daddy doesn’t eat birds/ and I said/ I know/ daddy doesn’t eat birds/ but that I have seen him/ standing by a bush/ hovering over two/ and I myself have been in his hand/ and leoninely loving/ he has licked me/ behind my ears/ that I eat pig for breakfast/ not unlike the pig/ Suzanne got the boys/ for Christmas/ but dead/ and not so loud/ as the graveyard/ we drove by/ to get to their house/ to see the pig/ in a crate/ god it was so grey/ in Missouri/ I thought/ everyone probably wanted to die/ that maybe I prefer fish/ but it makes a thermometer/ of my blood/ that I like things/ in wrappers/ that turn my fingers orange/ that I have already eaten/ but for some reason/ I am talking about hunger/ because hunger/ is elliptical/ like love/ or good correspondence/ that the plums/ are actually on the counter/ because I don’t like biting/ into cold fruit/ with my teeth/ I like it room temperature/ I like the split and spill/ of spoiled things/ before they spoil
Soft Bodies
While sweeping the carcasses of ladybugs into a blue dust pail, I think of how it might be a good idea to build soft bodies around robots, or of how I might use my own soft body to surround a good, patient robot who has only mechanical desires. I could donate the flesh of my thighs and the pulp of my lungs, and seeing this robot on the street, you might think she is me, and maybe you would speed up because you remember that terrible thing I did three falls ago, or maybe you would slow down, because, twice, I was nice at drop-off. I would like to feel oil slowly poured into my ear. My student says that if we can offer robots to the ill and infirm no one will have bed sores, and my Facebook feed says that my dad’s stepmother died several days ago, and yesterday, taking Eva for braces, I thought it would be easier if her teeth were constructed out of manmade materials and would, thus, already be straight. There are buttons on my back which can be pressed to make me audibly moan. For what I am hardwired, I cannot say.
Room for Rent
I am looking to fill a room this winter. The window frames the window’s frame, and, right now, there is snow falling, though, of course, by the time you read this and email me and look for the keys that let you in wherever you already live and spit-comb your brows and find your scarf and wait for the train and get on the train and read whatever dog-eared volume of poetry you happen to have in your bag and turn away once, hearing a voice that sounds an awful lot like a voice you thought you had forgotten, and then turn back to the poems, but with more longing, the snow will have stopped. It always stops; it always starts again. In this way, it is like geraniums. I eat white foods from white bowls and fear some things more than others. Also, there are tens of light switches along my walls, and sometimes I cannot find them. I hope that this will not dissuade you. Small pets are welcome. I once carried a baby bird for so long in a flannel I didn’t even realize it had died.
Image Credits: Pedro Henrique Corrêa
