At Home with Young Children

The plastic man
does a two-day headstand
on the couch,
painted-on pants
not gravity-bunched
around his thighs,
solid brown hair
not fluffing down
toward the floor
in any yogic mop.
He tries to talk to me
through his straight pink lips
about Kierkegaard and James Joyce,
but the continuous chatter of the animate
drowns him out.