soul animals

[soulasylum_]

I had forgotten the dull little stars wrapped in
red gift paper and Satan's men
ironing my clothes while I slept.
I tried to be grand for it, but my heart's
a city park: there's nothing anybody
does but lunch
by the broken
carousel, swing from twisted
limbs, copy Vivaldi, lean
forward, and fall
in love while I simply observe.

Yours are the rounded fingertips of
everyone I know, mooneyed,
starlucky, soul-animals, pale, nearly invisible,
warning ourselves, overnight, very whitely,
discreetly, our heels and our hammers.
The day melts and I lean forward,
lean back into the white part of a new soul,
and I think I can feel everything.

You overuse the future tense, immense
and gentle, and try to get me to
iron my own clothes, to stay put.
The little laburnum outside the big
window that cries and embellishes
nighttime shadows, it's cursed and
watching, even though you always said
you never noticed it. Maybe
it's the lack of mirrors, the laziness
of time and the way the end
of
the
street
just
swallows
it
while you aren't looking.