i, thief, am alive too,
right?

Where will I be this time next year?

bp bp bp bp
footsteps nearing me
why do i get nervous
bp bp bp bp
wait
i’m alone
my heartbeat again
bp bp bp bp bp bp bp

i haven’t been sleeping
but i sleep good when i do
lots of dreams lately
but they’re all too realistic

i’ve been daydreaming about vietnam:
i’m following this lady
who sells bananas on a bike
she’s leading me through the bazaar
to find man who sells spice
spice man just cracked a watermelon
the juice running down his hands
the aroma strong, clean
i can’t speak vietnamese
but i wonder how much he’d haggle
on a wedge

this morning on my cold walk
air blew back my rusty hair
i was purposeful tardy
but i was happy
i saw the browned ginkgo biloba leaves
limp by my feet
-they’re lucky you know, the ginkgo leaves
and i wondered if banana woman had ever seen ginkgo

last night, when I dreamt I was a fish
slipping into the water to guide red, glossy trout upstream
who slid out of the water to back the subterfuge I’d designed to infiltrate and destroy not the lush
foliage walled house or the empty lawn with dining chairs and napkins all scattered, but rather the entity with no face
which made its home there and set up traps and laid in wait and yet, through any danger I felt there was also calm
and the air did not feel too thin or too heavy
but rather as if your warm breath was behind me, and you were behind me
standing with the fish women and their cool eyes gazing past me and hands upon my shoulders, and we were the strong, quiet water

Often
Wondering
This fickle bit
Of picked wind hit
Tossing my hair
In blur

seemingly
continuous
and
never begun
burns my hand
and my tongue

my feet
like air
murmur past
flatiron towns
of nothing and everything
the obscurity of it all
does not keep me up
unless intentionally

and temporary towns
for momentary bounds
bonds
beds for my heads
that linger
in sound
irritated as their best state
and suspension as their worst

And so I ponder
Longer
And still longer
When