category 2

clothes fall over the plastic basket
pile inside the dryer waiting for hangers
hang outside open drawers hungry for the legs
of hookers and men on the prowl.

stammering out of the corner of the mirror
yesterday's shade pinches the inside of the purple
bra and licks her fingers. it smells like money.

the boy is blowing into a bamboo pipe.
when it's raised to the ceiling, an elephant
walks into the room, no matter how many times
it's been told not to think of itself.

of course the moths are buzzing with harley voices
barely connected to the night with its full moons
its sirens giggling under the bleachers
its worms struggling in the wait of the earth.

under one of the trailers a cat in heat
is getting rid of that noise. she left her babies
with daddy because snarling with her tail
in the air didn't seem to be giving him tricks.

a woman raises a sword in one hand, examines the long
lifeline in the other. she wants a ghazal to slice
it into manageable chunks, not this unwieldy steel and balance.
















*()&*(*&


align oneself with hope


they say it's all in how you look at it.
so you give someone your heart and trust them
not to break it. when they hand it back to you
you might make a mold of the teeth imprinted there
to place in your bedside water cup
as prophylactic against a return. you might
think at least i don't need superglue you
might take the dna
from the saliva
and clone a copy

or you might take the chewed up patient to the vet.
so many possibilities, most of them spur of the moment
and mostly ineffectual. the thing to do is
cauterize. burn it out of you. over and over till
the scar becomes a kitten playing
with string on the verge of weaning.
it needs a home. you decide
to give it one. you don't know where
trust has run off to, probably
mixing genes with hope
to breed yet another tasty morsel
for diana's dinner with cupid.
whatever. you think.
i like balloons.