White antlers of the night
exacerbate my soul.
There were gerbils
at angles unheard of,
perpendicular to themselves.
These gerbils: my little sister
in her prom dress more expensive
than mine.
This was in Cleveland.
And so on.
And so on.
This is the kind of thing
they mostly print these days,
desperate attempts to say
something new in a new way,
display awareness of everything known,
torture metaphors to death,
confess repugnances no one asked to hear.
Someone printed an essay
that claimed Faulkner’s Rose for Emily
could be about Eskimos.
Sure.
I devote my days, now,
to doing whatever I see
needs doing that I can do,
until some vision appears
telling me it’s time
to make some more noise.
Or doesn’t appear. Meantime,
some things will have been done
that needed doing.
Even in Cleveland.
