is the business of doing
the same show we sleep for?
Can the man with all of the
money be shown the right door?
These riddles are plenty. I
come to you guilty with heart
burn. Will turnips, will
tulips suffice? How about
the mice in the closet an old
flame left me back in September?
They thrive. Will death
take me scared up to heaven
with feeling while they learn
new ways to eat cheese from
a trap? A contraption of death
that refuses seizure, won’t seize
them, resists any method to
silence the vermin, in fact,
takes as pleasure, a sort of
contagion, to find them
commingling and bruising
their whiskers with high-pitched
titters made distinct by the small
est of differences that might could
exist between individual sets of
tiny mouse teeth. I can hear
them from here, they teehee
in the closet, as I lay in my bed
all alone and I wonder (in awe)
if my neurons (they wander) escape
from my head, through my window,
and fly through the night just to lie
with the neurons of others (like me,
all alone and in wonder) whose
own neurons fly then directly at me
to bedazzle my dreams. What an
exchange that would be! Do we
dream in our death throes?
Isn’t that what I’m doing? Or
perhaps I will wake up to coffee
with cream and some Splenda,
or (if I arise) will there be none of
that waiting for me? On this
thought will I perish?
Enough with this freight-
train of questions, my dear.
I promise to answer
each query at sunrise.
Will you be here? And
promptly? You must
certainly know this by now,
my dear darling, but my
breath is far too precious
to waste.
(So, make haste!)
