waiting for the ambulance
that ghosts foretell will never come
is the softly shaking whisper
that quaking issues from
the broken

bag of bones! flop of flesh
here blood and muscle press
and in the aching solitude
of pain
the fracture falters fresh

resounding reality cracks
like this mistake against pavement

nothing peels away
the curtains of a dreamy day
like splintered bones
and breaks that may
never heal

but at least you really saw the unicorn

i found you like an unnoticed treasure at a garage sale
hidden near old sheets and dusty furniture

and your arms were the bubble
outside of which was only reality
and a thousand things i didn’t want any part of

you told me you’d lived entire lifetimes in dreams
so we slept next to each other to see what would happen
and somewhere along the way between dreaming and not
between pillow talk and nagging questions
i forgot i was supposed to be able to let you go

where were you last night
when i found the secret room behind our bed?
i was trying to tell you, but i could only whisper
and you were sleeping so not even bagpipes could wake you

you told me you wanted just one truth to build from
and i said the truth is a question
just a game that we’re losing
with rules that pretend at dimension
but dimension is a lie
a figment
a fragment of us and tea yesterday
and you said no, there is more than that
because here we are, and what are we?
and i said we are a ripple in the rain.

you believe in substance and i believe in you
but we are made of limitations and hesitations
we are only patterned variations
we have left our shoes at the door of causation
and i forgot i was supposed to be able to let you go

if fish flew farther
fishermen could catch them
without going to sea

the dark sushi bar
has an especially dark
corner booth for you

finally some sun
to keep vitamin d up
and cool down the pale

the mountain does not
bend, even though it itches
the rock slide teases

Alfred Hitchcock is
dead and yet chocolate syrup
still makes a sweet blood

i don’t understand
dungeons and dragons and so
very many things

they call me crazy
when i wear my bra outside
my shirt on some days

an ode to white walls
blank canvases crisp and smooth
that never can last

the usher shows you
to your fifty dollar seat
behind a large hat

i have slept 12 hours
and yet i am still sleepy
chronic fatigue *****

rob plays games like a
fiend—new media crumbles
beneath his fingers

the theme is green
and there are stars in your eyes
as you vindictively plot restlessness

there are eyes in your stars
as you contemplate
the heavenly spread of deceased dust

hey small thing, you’re shedding
and all these dropped DNA samples
will clutter a multiverse
that has already forgotten
what toothpaste you use
where you slept
or that you slept
when you slept
if you slept

the theme is a clock
in your grandmother’s house
ticking like a bomb in the desert

and all the sun from all the days
of chlorine-drenched reminiscences
is wiped away by a single stroke of time

a moment slides home stretched
like the cover over an over-fluffed pillow
and this is unquantifiable reverie
an array of star-soaked ideals
things you will never grow up to be
knowing you will never grow up
even once you grow up
and even after

double-spaced reports on
summer vacation and tax returns
are geologically arranged

the theme is maybe
and it is cumbersome to think
that the stars in your eyes
are made of something much older
than purple