from THE BIRD ARTIST
The man who sells magazines has the largest hands I've ever seen.
Keeps licking his fingers, fondling the pages. His tongue darts out,
then back in and my knees ache with spring. With the hinges in my haunches,
the feathers in my lungs. The whipoorwill spins on its weathervane
in every direction. What is desire, but a soft turning of every gear
in the body? The wrought interior, where the prism shatters with sun.
What is want, but a fistful of pennies in the mouth? A slap, a kiss.
The cabinet where the shelves are always empty. How do we determine
the border between lovers, the levers that twitch and release?
The space behind the garden shed where my head bent against
the paint and left a mark. The hand prints on my thighs
and the bluebells in my hair. The ticking of the metronome
inside the heart that pulls the wire that shakes the rattle
that breaks the glass again and again.
