Probably you’ll solve gravity, flesh 

out our microbiomics, split our God 

particles into their constituent bits 

of christs and antichrists probably, 

probably you’ll find life as we know it 

knitted into nooks of the chattering 

cosmos, quaint and bountiful as kismet 

and gunfights in the movies probably, 

probably, probably you have no patience

for the movies there in your eventual 

arrondissement where you have more

credible holography, more inspiring

actual events, your ghazals composed 

of crow racket, retrorockets, glaciers 

breaking, your discotheques wailing

probably, probably, probably, probably 

too late a sentient taxi airlifts you 

home over a refurbished riverbank, 

above the rebuilt cathedral, your head 

dozing easy in the crook of your arm,

emptied of any memory of these weeks 

we haven’t slept you’ve been erupting 

into that hereafter like a hydrant on fire, 

like your mother is an air raid, and I am 

an air raid, and you’re a born siren 

chasing us out of your airspace probably

we’ve caught 46 daybreaks in 39 days, 

little emissary arrived to instruct us,

we wake now you shriek us awake,

we sleep now you leave us to sleep.

While crossing the river of shorn paper,

I forget my name. My body,

a please leave. I want a patron saint

that will hush the dog growling

at trimmed hedges it sees in the night.

I want the world to be without language,

but write my thoughts down just in case.

Send help, the dog’s growling

won’t let me sleep. I haven’t slept in days.

I am looking for a patron saint, but none

will let me pray for guidance. There is a buzz

in my right ear that never goes away, no matter

how hard I hit the side of my head

for loose change. Most mornings I wonder

who I can pray to that will make sure I never

have to survive waking again. Most nights

I forget to pray the rosary, though I sleep with it

by the bed. I’ve never owned a TV because

I’ll replay this conversation in my head.

My dead lovers are hungry in the kitchen,

so I fix them food they cannot eat. I make toast

of vellum paper, fry an egg made of crepe.

I only want a patron saint to protect me.

I only want someone else to bleed.

While crossing the river of shorn paper,

I forget my name. My body,

a please leave. I want a patron saint

that will hush the dog growling

at trimmed hedges it sees in the night.

I want the world to be without language,

but write my thoughts down just in case.

Send help, the dog’s growling

won’t let me sleep. I haven’t slept in days.

I am looking for a patron saint, but none

will let me pray for guidance. There is a buzz

in my right ear that never goes away, no matter

how hard I hit the side of my head

for loose change. Most mornings I wonder

who I can pray to that will make sure I never

have to survive waking again. Most nights

I forget to pray the rosary, though I sleep with it

by the bed. I’ve never owned a TV because

I’ll replay this conversation in my head.

My dead lovers are hungry in the kitchen,

so I fix them food they cannot eat. I make toast

of vellum paper, fry an egg made of crepe.

I only want a patron saint to protect me.

I only want someone else to bleed.