Here all of the walls are dead.
Here I am a noose in the crowd,
and I am scalding in a puffed winter jacket.
On the subway there is a girl I recognize;
she looks like the nightgown I had
when I was three years old.
It was blue threaded with white.
I wore it like a second skeleton.

Sometimes now I have dreams in which I am
standing outside wearing nothing but the nightgown
and I am trying to find the moon, but it is gone,
it is not even night, it is not even anything. Then
it is morning and I am sprung up panting
like a motorcycle, my skin turned to waves.

I get off at Chambers Street, accidentally
bumping into the girl before graphing
my way onto the platform. I forget
to apologize, I forget how to speak,
mostly because the nightgown is still
stapled to my waist and won’t let me go.