Slum

My manuscripts are hers. I find no solace in puddles, no security in single, silver spoons. She is there, always. My breath is not safe. Her ghosts floats out in puffs, that so go to the very ozone. Like a dirty cigarette from my nose, (I am like a Frenchman in these moments) She occupies the coldest days. And I veil my face with this shameful mantilla, knowing that nobody knows her in God's walls. She never breathed on God's walls. I gasp tiny sighs with silk and milk against my cheeks, and steadfast arms hold, hugging my own, forcefully making my home that houses two curtains. (I never loved that Sun) It was sang to me each day, a voyage through her lips until she died to leave a poor man's replacement behind; a machine that knew how to boil broths and rice, to switch on the lights. I am a bowl for her spit, an ashtray for her choking paper stubs. A basin for the sickness. That is I, I, I, I never knew you. My wrists are wrapped in twine, soon to be sold for a dime, for a dime. Night by nightly I see she, known by her smell and the way she forces me into the truck, The Judentruck. Her froggy eyes marvel the world like a lazy fly. I know her, because she appears as I, if I surrendered an earthly life for the height of the Everest, Appalachians, for the sight of atmospheric curvature full as her fat, happy belly, full jug full stop. Clam-hands smother my mouth and again, the smell of China. Each night I am under again.