A tree still asymmetrical from lightning
in its cheerful youth, an idle spirit by the door
in tender hesitation. You chose a fairly blue morning
for your dream, she said, the girl with cobweb
on her hand and a smile like a new pair of scissors
or a sleepy dog harassed by a mockingbird.
An angel playing solitaire on a table by the door
beneath a painting of a person fundamentally lost
and a butterfly with eyes along the edges of her wings,
the rusted edge of a Chevy coming in from the left.
What's the curve of a life and is it ever visible?
That's a question. We don't think of the rain as a story
or even a sentence, she said. People here are crazy
every day, she said, today it's like noises banging
at a dirty door, not sure if I'm inside or outside.
The baby stares at small hallucinations: the nail an eye,
the cake a city, the clarinet, about to curve or speak.
She yawns like a cat does, completely, she's round like
the world, she's forgotten the previous tear.