my hotplate works, too, but it
isn’t a source of heat necessary
to anything but toasting bread
or limping out a box of pasta.
who here has conversations
with dead people? a few of the
outcasts on burnham street begin
to raise their hands until he says
he’s not talking about those kinds
of conversations. he’s got his hand
in his pocket and we’re all waiting
to see which bird balloon, which
coal-mine canary, which version of
flight of the bumblebees comes out
betwixt thumb and forefinger. who’ll
be able to read the cover. people begin
venturing – perhaps, perhaps up to the
third row. but no further than the fifth.
the ghosts hear these mutterings and
respond in kind, knowing the truth of
the matter. only a mother knows how
to let her boy go free. it’s the bottom
of the barrel for everyone else. spread
your wings all you trilingual poets! says
the magician, as the turtle that has just
appeared very slowly walks off, stage left.
