we won’t tell you where it lies, as in time
we might need the minor intimacy
of that secret. just creatures, heavy with hope
& begging against the grave song inside
our living, we have agreed his death is
the one cold chord we refuse to endure

from the sorry endlessness of the blues.
& if ever we fail to bear the rate at which
we feel the world pining for the body
of our boy, we can conjure that mole—the small
brown presence of it tucked where only tenderness
would think to look—& recall when it seemed

nothing about our child could drift beyond
the terrible certainty of love’s reach.

before sleep

and carry a box cutter

for protection

you are an animal that is all loins

and no dexterity

you are the loneliness

and non-loneliness of a planet with a flag in it

and something ugly raccoon-paws

the inner lining of your throat

but you swallow it

and you smash a snow globe in a parking lot

and you leave the door open

to the tea factory’s peppermint room

contaminating everything

the sleepytime blend

the almond sunset and genmaicha

the hibiscus broth your parents made you drink

to prevent recurrent UTIs

and outside the palm trees

in need of treatment for exotic diseases

keep dying

slowly like a woman circling a parking lot

and if you had to name what you think you are

you would say bogwolf

and the thing clawing your throat

draws blood

but you swallow it

and you live for the ways people in love penetrate

each other

for the sweetness of lichens

for the return of normal hand smell

after wearing latex gloves

you thank the bones that made your soup

and all the brake pedals that aren’t broken