THE WASHING MACHINE fills with water. Oak pollen attacks my sinus cavities, snot thick and drippy. Sunlight pours over a tree trunk by a clump of poison ivy. Find some clothes. Put on a shirt—the morning rituals of social preparation. A radio voice informs the day with grim news: "The world is shit, the world is fucked, your life is dirt." I look around. Woodpecker taps into a branch for bugs. Long-time neighborhood addicts and small-time hustlers sit on a porch across the street waiting for the day to open a little. Hoa's got Waylon in her arms. She eats eggs.
Forget what I'm
supposed to do
or be or know.
"I'm not an archive,"
to quote a famous
philosopher.
That ol' drag
Mnemosyne
give it a rest
already.
Sometimes it's enough
pulling goose grass
from my shoe laces.