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We maintain a critical distance from the sad spaniel gentlemen in cravats on the plaid duvet at the Custom Hotel, Los Angeles. We are so over it. We fly from terminal to terminal almost endlessly. We are almost money. We can wait at high speed.
Copyright © 2010 by Rae Armantrout. Used by permission of the author.
1
In the first cartoons
the mutability of forms
was a laugh riot:
bouncing biceps,
one foot growing huge
to stomp a cricket—
and staying that way.
The aye-aye’s
first finger.
Dressed all in plastic,
which means oil,
we’re bright-eyed, scrambling
for the colored cubes
spilled
on the rug’s polymer.
Inside each
is a tiny car.
When we can’t unscrew the tops
we cry for help.
1
We encountered a problem
sending
a command
to the program.
Did I say that
aloud?
I’ve broken out
in imps.
*
To be a blip
in a circuit
and to know it,
to relish
this knowledge
in your private
moments
as all moments
are gated
and switched.
2
When I mentioned hatred
I was not thinking
of you,
but you’d best not break
our momentum,