The sun feels more extravagant, the shorter the day.
Hanging like a pendant off a rich woman’s neck.
I get a haircut and scrub the stove, feeling unpeeled
from the old terror. I dreamed my apartment
was full of cats, hiding in rafters, in corners,
on top of the refrigerator. The bulging attic threatened
to collapse. One birthed kittens, leaving
a milky trail of clouds on the plastic floor.
In the mornings, the gold slouches in the hills,
and I pour myself out.
In Carl’s film, the footage of his mother
dead, pink covers pulled chin-close, the ellipses of face
that he had rubbed away, what he kept calling
human human human.
