the intensity in ur face scares me

u look right through me
when we argue now
u r supplanted by another
viper-coiled & ready to strike
ur venom ducts overflowing
when u used to look like alex chilton
it was tolerable
an eccentric & violent quirk i could abide
now that u look like tiny tim
u dont wear it well
u fill me with inert gasses
im bloated
& my heads in a fog

intertidal animals & intermittent
moments of flake
the pique
& the quake leave me blue
another earthquake shook
me up today in ma
as in massachusetts
is departing the mainland
before ca
as in california

i want to get back in bed
the world is no longer remotely
tolerable either
i feel like a pavlovian cur

these dreams
to live among the scorpions
in the desert is akin to mothers milk

my mother was a goat
she tried weeding me out
of the litter by hiding me
under a rock
then she kicked me
off the edge of a cliff

why do u sink so discretely
she yelled down as i fell
u think u r wile e coyote
bout to disappear in a puff
of smoke down in canyonland

u gotta another thing coming

“And nobody gets out of it, having to
swim through the fires to stay in
this world.”

—Mary Oliver / “Dogfish”