Laughter is close, even if it’s
just the schadenfreude

of middle-school girls,
their juicy, eye-rolling, malicious

glee flying
down the street (like a tiny pink slug

in a pigeon’s beak), hotting up
the air—why pretend

you can’t hear? Laughter,
the only eternity

that’s real. Laughter
and its toothy

lift off, even
when toxic. “Save me”

is what’s written
on the faces of so many

passing strangers,
“save me” & “fuck you.”

So the ancient Tibetan masters
teach, focused as they are

both by the attar of sage burning
and the wailing of toddlers

by a septic tank—
a thousand years dead,

these teachers,
but still dreaming

they’re fast asleep
in their boyhood beds.