There's a bee at your window and you're miss cleo
at the drop of a dime. you place both fists on
your temples (as in a headache)
and i watch you slowly open them,
fingers creeping across your forehead
like starfish

in that dark blue ocean of no thought
you're able to guess at the intangible.
triangles, precise movement of stars,
how the dow jones will tumble down
the stairs like a slinky

and in one breadth, there is too much to see
and so you stumble through your lines
(the way mad actresses do in their beginning
stages or first auditions)

i have to listen intently for what
you are telling me:
'basketfulls of sunshine
and a rose garden. now i see a cellar.
now a large metal door'
(she opens this door without hesitation
or keys or discretion)

'i see two boys, one stroking the other'
(i am in fact the smaller one. along with my clothes,
youth is slipping off the stem of my body like
a rose bud.)

i cannot tell you the number of times
i've been jammed into bed
like a letter rushed into its envelope,
have had cows at the end of my lazy days
drift across the outer fields of my cornea;
attempts to lull myself to sleep. they continue
multiplying, outnumbering my days,
thrusting themselves on top of each other
and passionate in broad daylight.

beyond that i am still confined by cement walls,
mold and fungi and the pederasty
of a basement.