January 16th, 2015


House of Cards , Radiohead, 2007

The pillow has done violence to my face
like a cloud crossing the moon.

Loneliness is a powerful thing

Gee wiz, Kafka.

Kafka follows me through all
the corridors of my memory

through all the blue rooms
of his blue book

his ears catch the sunlight
and shine orange, bloodlit

veins like eyelids -
the inside -

like swallowing
a flashlight

his ears are lanterns
and his eyes are caves
his tongue is a candle

when there are rocks he goes
before me

and when there is silence
he opens his mouth

and his tongue flickers
over words I hadn't yet thought to say. 

I think it might be true that we 
choose the color we are, 

Kafka. We choose the grey. 
We collect things, and then we 
dismantle them until arms 
and legs are everywhere. 

One day Kafka and I are sitting
on a stone wall we've found in the
woods and I am saying, over and
over, because he can't quite hear
me through the years, I had wanted
bone broth, but I really didn't 
mean to use their bones to do it. 

He smiles and his sharp face
almost cuts me.

We get lost in the folds
of my pillow and he chokes
on the down.

It is a mercy he is already dead.