WHAT A RELIEF
I finally have espied
the rumored dog
two chain-link fences over.
He is huger
than promised!
The rumor of him
has closed
around my life
for two weeks now
like his giant, rumored
mouth. The certain dog
that lives in my house
is named Little Brother,
like a human, and takes
tramadol twice daily
by way of warm cheese.
Even the disgusting chunks
of life do not delight today.
In the shower, my new loofa
shakes the soap into thick dollops
that land on my skin
like cream. I am the messy
and delicious underside
of something new to the market.
Why am I back in the shower again?
I used to play
this video game
in which Spiderman says,
over and over,
“Hey, how did we get back to the city?”
I’ve been thinking
about that sentence
for twenty whole years.
What if a shower was so important
that it absolved someone
of a murder charge,
like in that movie I wrote.
Often I believe
that I exist
to remember
everything, and do
nothing
about it. But then I smack
a dutiful yoga mat
across the ground,
and begin the meaningful work
of giving myself
less credit.
Today I was interviewed
about my poems for the first time
and one of the interns responsible said,
“This next one is hard to explain.
I guess my question is, ‘liquids.’”
Do you know, I mean
can I tell you what I would give
to look across the table at someone
and say “You want to get out of here?”
and watch them nod,
and watch them get up,
and watch them go.