Poetry

mary is an old woman without shoes.
she doesn’t believe it.
not when her belly starts to bubble

Just because I was born
precisely here or there,
in some cold city or other,
don’t think I don’t remember
how I came along like a grain
carried by the flood—

The trouble with you is you’re not
loving enough. A drastic
summons, a trumpet of

Poetry is not a code
to be broken
but a way of seeing
with the eyes shut,

I can’t
drive anymore and find a park in Bakersfield
where it is quiet and there are no
other cars. And can’t sleep.

So what if he was old enough to slough her off?
The night of her news he made an exception—