I’ve been guilty of losing track of what is holy—
the antique candle holder we used 
to prop open the fire escape window in our 
bedroom, or the song sparrow that flew inside one morning
and blessed us as we slept. I remember the
air flowing through my body, the buzz 
of my hands trembling as we pursued 
the bird with a Tupperware container,
catching it and releasing it back onto the
weathered rug out on the fire escape, 
and the sound of the man shouting 
to a friend across the street as I put 
my body out the window to set the bird free; 
in that moment, I was sure the man 
had witnessed our awe and terror
until I saw his friend jogging lightly across the
street to hug him, and I realized he had not
seen us, not looked up even once. When you asked 
me what I was feeling later that morning, 
I had already forgotten about 
the amount of air I felt in my body, and I said 
I was wondering about the differences between 
what is beautiful and what is real. What
I meant to say is, My love, I feel so small and
insignificant and so full of grief,
and I don’t think I understand anything. 
In the afternoon, down by the Hudson, 
we watched the sun set over New Jersey, 
breathing in the wind dancing across the water, 
and you touched the back of your hand
to mine and asked me, Are you not astonished? 
while I stared mournfully toward the darkening horizon, 
and as we walked back to our apartment, 
they had opened a fire hydrant on our street, 
and a woman—a beautiful woman 
wearing a white linen dress— 
held her baby over the spouting hydrant, 
like an offering to God.

It is September and there is no love

cleaner: apples red as a ribbon

knotted around the white dove’s

broken neck. As schoolchildren,

we were brought into the orchards,

biting into Empires and tossing

what we didn’t want, told that

we always can. I grew too tall

too early, and still, in mazes built

of hay, pretended to not already see

the routes to all their naked ends.

COTIDIANA

Sometimes it is the air
entering from the cracked window above my bed
crisp and sharp with the smell of pepper-tree leaves.

Sometimes, it is how the ten year old boy
reads a book while balancing on his right foot,
left leg stretching toward the ceiling
nothing but his blue and white striped briefs to keep him warm.

Or it’s how the four year old girl, face stained with
blueberry juice, squawks, mimes 
the beak of a Pterosaur before hiding in a cardboard 
box, begging to be left there,
packed up in the dark just long enough to be
sure of what it would feel like to have 
to fight her way out. 

Each child takes turns,
until they crawl in together
to draw on the inside.

Sometimes it is the box itself,
the one the man carries
in “Michiko Dead.” 
How he never puts it down.
Just moves it to his head
when his arms tire,
so he can go on
before bringing
it back to his chest again.

CALIFORNIA FIRES

As flames sweep across valleys
and smoke billows and plumes,
the sky blooms golden
like the pigment Caravaggio used
in 1591 when painting The Sacrifice of Isaac.

The old father’s hand pressing Isaac’s neck into 
the ground, the gunmetal gray knife less yellow
near the boy’s slender, contorted shoulder. An angel
gripping Abraham’s wrist to stop him,
to let him know that God is pleased, that the boy
does not have to be butchered. The ram,
looking up, seems to say, take me
instead.

The fires burning all around, but out of frame.
The haze that highlights the old man’s wrinkled
forehead and Isaac’s open mouth is everywhere.
The flames disappearing whole orchards, houses,
twisting iron.

What is it about the human mind that resists
signs of destruction?
We hold out hope that, like Abraham, someone else
will save us from ourselves.

The trees on the hill, one cypress, one pine
are dying of thirst. I have avoided having
dogs up to this point because I was 
afraid of caring for something that couldn’t
talk back, couldn’t say you understand nothing.

The town needed a new mayor. 
As usual, no one wanted to do it.
My severe anxiety makes me a poor candidate, 
said one woman. Oh please, said a man. 
That’s nothing. I am literally a psychopath. 
The meeting had reached an impasse. 
So be it, announced the eldest librarian. 
Bring out Harold. The glass cage 
containing the small yellow lizard 
was fetched from its official chamber. 
The librarian removed the lid and turned 
the cage onto its side, allowing Harold 
to step into the light. The crowd fell silent
in the presence of a cousin consciousness. 
For ten seconds, Harold stood motionless. 
I glanced at Angelika, who was staring 
fixedly at the lizard. The stakes were high 
for her—I knew that—and her furrowed 
brow betrayed it. I stared at Harold too, 
directly into his dark, indecipherable eyes. 
He pivoted, took one step to his left, then paused. 
Would he pick Delmore, as had long 
been speculated? A whole tense minute 
passed like this, during which he seemed
to be gazing at all of us at once— 
and not just at us, but also at our children, 
our decisions, and all of the awful music 
we had allowed to grow popular.
Without warning, Harold turned 
and ran back into his cage! 
We rejoiced, even as the librarian 
began to weep. Of course we understood 
what this meant: we were free now 
to destroy ourselves in peace.

Years between these long
                                 thin rooms. Life
of corridors, doorway
                                 to a doorway. Along
one wall: onions line
                                 a shelf, white bulbs
bright as bone in the cool
                                 dark. Potatoes

heaped like golden
                                 fists. Beneath the jaw’s
cusp: no rhythm. Denied
                                 even the body’s
metronome. Here,
                                 nothing rots:
root-home, wine-
                                 keep. Always the bitter

edge of arrival, the mind’s
                                 talent for suspension.
From above: whorl of these
                                 walls, print of God’s
own massive finger, swirl
                                 of his eye—and its center: me,
the pupil, black chasm,
                                 lightless hallway.

This stagnancy: its own kind
                                 of decay. I am the tunnel
into the mountain. I am more
                                 beast every day.