he settles on a word not because it is right but because his exhaustion has developed an independent streak and has abbreviated its calling to* terrain.  *I talk with him about the origin of praise and he imagines a woman swimming solo in a cirque.  he looks me over as if I too am held together by my clothes.  any sentence I come up with begins ‘the female form…’ and ends.  though painful, I rub my knees.