I Wanted to be
a Citizen of the World
I’ve been talking
about the weather:
cold white liquidand sad musical
a moan for barren trees
scratching the surface
of a pale afternoon
there should bea death in the family.
Octoberis the slow death of seasons
vitality drains from rooftops
I grow scales
form opinions
do nothing to alter course
I no longer believe
in the weatherman
I’ve lost teethto the ice and
found illusion
under pillows
salt burns holesin my tongue
I taste
as I do.
A man sharpens edges
door to door
tell him howin anger
I broke a window
bled on the floor
and changed nothing
but the temperature of the room.
He’ll believe
it’s a liethough the bleeding
is real and internal
lung spleen kidney
melting
walk away
wonderhow cold
a man can be
without burial.
Sometimes
I stand in line
all day
letting others
ahead.
It’s odd how
I never
remember names
someone told me
the trick is
to repeat
three times in theimmediate
conversation.
Strangehow I never
remember names.
I can cry at will
and the idea
bores me.
Late night
and I hear thunder
or the sound of moving furniture
the fine line between ceiling and floor
the people upstairsare moving and
taking the hot water
the landlord is latecollecting rent
again
to prove I live hereI barricade the door
and until you were so
unexpected that day and
out of the rain
no one knew
and even thenyou were unsure
why I took so long
why the scrapingof wood on the floor and
I said I’m not
proud of the room and
changed it for you
you said nothing
only glanced at the desk
on its end
with a lamp
I said a giftfrom a sculptor friend
a satire of the business world
you knew
I knew
you knew
I was lying.
I want to be
a citizen of the world
and the world
has no idea.
Predicted by a manwith sharp pencils and
satellite vision
I never occur.
In absenceI know nothing
but static and crossed lines:
Yes, I love youbut sometimes
I wish you would
please stop talking
convinced there is no such thing
as silence
and weighted by the thought
I fall
sink to bottom
escaping restrictions
of weather and form
I grow to monstrous proportion
risk occasional appearance
and wait for the silence
of an echo about to happen.
And then youdeeply beyond and swimming
against my understanding
of the current
of the tide
of October and the rain
and anywayyou are almost sure
there is no such thing as silence.
Listen.
Cars drive by
on the wet street.
