ashtrays, mugs and
moments: rattle within, outside their place.
our brittle, needy bones
support head,
appetite-shorn body: Bouldering.
Walking. |Wicking. Mushing bridges
churning-over water, tide.
High-regard neighbor’s children re-
move plastic decorations while that grandpa
hangs-- alive,
stayed-- in unused gutters, -o! Wind and
snow-flaked, grassy yardstomps lead us
with body-**** coats to-
doors, somedays-ies and happenstance
below mortuaries, toe-
tags, dangling shoe-string,
draping clothes'-
line our spindly, warrowed hallways
between blankets, sweaty
feelers lie, their
harrowed, heaving trunks hold night-trees/
palms aloft and hopeful.

a glint, a chance, a something.
wicker furniture, lace.
a bed, a "yes." Please,
a you.