Beware!

Beware!

Beware! You have been infected with spyware!
Every image you have looked at is still there,
there for all to see out in the internet.
Their monitors are periscopes.

Your account information! It is strung out
like sheets stretched their full wingspan
on a clothesline, backlit by sun.
Your numbers are showing!

It is there on every page you have seen,
infecting you! Anyone you’ve emailed
is at risk: your boss, children,
your third grade teacher.

Click here to remove any threat! Click here
now! This software will destroy your
information, your memory.
It could break your life.

Cut Once

Cut Once

Pick up your saws, your scissors, your swords,
for today we cut.

Decisions are incisions. Moving forward and
pulling away from.

The painter’s tape is hugging the woodwork,
a bandage, blue frosting.

Paint on the brush, brush on the wall. Go.
Pound the hammer

like a gavel, put the nail inside the plaster.
This pomegranate,

this avocado, this pineapple. Slice it in half
and eat. You won’t

get it wrong, you can’t. Order the entree that
you cannot pronounce.

Out with the stitches. Send it. Call them. Ask
for the thing you want

most, you know you want to. Admit it. Say
what you did not say

even if you say it to the dog, to yourself alone
in the car, driving.

Spokesperson

Spokesperson

Shall I represent you.
Who is in need of a spokesperson.

I will speak on your behalf.
You will never want for words.

Carry me on your back.
I’ll cling to you, call out your needs

ahead of you, from over
your shoulder. I can assist you with

the most challenging tasks:
what to say in departures, how to go

away knowing you will not
return, will never see any of this.

Both parties share awareness
when somebody leaves. I will wrap

my arms around you from
the back, lean forward and tell you,

softly so that only you
will hear, They will be fine, and they

will remember. And then
my job, your public voice, I’ll yell,

Farewell, friends! Big smile
from me, and you will be facially

free to process this scene
however you like. My declarations

are steady, you can trust
that in me. I will be truthful for you,

but aware of who we speak
to, and what they need. Of all blizzards,

this one has been my favorite,
for example. Or, Please pardon this viral

infection, I am not quite myself,
when you are ill, coughing for hours,

stomach sore from the work.
In silence, you will feel so much more.

I Could Care Less

I Could Care Less

I could care less,
I could,
but instead, I care
so much,
so phenomenally.
It happens
when we look, this
mountain
range-sized adoration
welling up
inside us in response
to all that
is present alongside
us, and all
that existed before
the human
thumb squeezed
the top of
the common era’s
stopwatch.
The seven holes in our
heads help
us to take in what we
can of the
ever-altering wilderness
here for us,
with us. How is this not
collaboration.

Get Your Bearings

Get Your Bearings

Get your bearings here,
select them from this bin,
little and silver. Confront
their smallness. Roll them
around in your hand, cold,
molecular. Hardware is
everywhere, tucked as
unobtrusively in joints
as grammar in your mother
tongue. Get your bearings,
no, not those, those are
spoken for. By me. My
bearings won’t be much
help to you. What are you
attracted to here, in parts,
I mean, what gets your gears
spinning. Would you look
at your reflection in these,
have you ever seen yourself
look more capable or radiant.