THAT I BUILT A CATAPULT

My bicycle had been stolen & I still hadn't told
my father (the one who gave it to me).
My glasses were partially devoured by my dog (Cricket), and,
oh - I guess this was nearly a year ago.

This was the brown carpet time.

Fogged windows in July. Plant food and soil.

Grandma raised carrion in this house after Papa fell
dead under the pear tree, midway through a delicate piss.
I would have loved to be there, to let him die
away with me nearby. I was out trying to locate my bicycle.
After his death even Grandma's oldest friends said she wasn't the same.
Her eyeballs fit differently into her head and her hands changed
in tone and complexity, sprouting four new fingers.

Flesh in bleach, Bible slow-boiled.
Paper made of bread, water, and salt.

I'm confusing myself. Back to my grandmother's house.

We lived in the ceiling:
We stayed asleep indefinitely, laughing
desperate villages into tinder, to catch and to burn.
To make kindling of a century.
This way we couldn't be caught unaware of those who
fell dead and dumb where we lay naked.
This way we wouldn't be the sissies without
revolvers or breaths left to take.
This way we were more awkward than those
before us, sang lighter, stood less often.

Shaved our pencils into novels.

Slaved over hot tempers.

We sucked out murder and marrow,
sharpened our teeth as if in a fever.

Grandmother never noticed,
busy hiding my bicycle on a different
planet each day.