Meditation on a broken child, var. 2
Days when clouds are a lid on the vulgarity of inhabited spaces
at times obscenity becomes an operator’s manual
wonder where I last set love down to cool it off
and the lid is sometimes lifted but jubilation is gone along with its gestures
its brash smashed face and arms bright with blood
punished by an optimistic joyride into the unknown
then other families affront me like a breast on whose nipple I may not suck
the world’s cervix constricts around a neck half-out
as motherhood reverses its fleshy gears to decompose
rejection a solid form like plexiglass along an interminable countertop
separating the broken from the well-oiled functional
everyday models of neurologic competence and vivacity
days on the outside of reality facing in toward a moment not mine
measuring loss against the burlap of turned backs
and shredded ribbons of words I would never say —