Words that we care about

Jonah says a poem is words that we care about,

words like letters spelled c-a-t, sounds like kāk, named Britta.

Outside a cardinal prophesies from the roof below

the arrival of a letter that echoes like church bells.

Well, I want to run from that lonely song! 

With cat and cake and Britta in tow
I will warble my way to a tomorrow 
where silence can be a poem, too... 

where silence isn’t the same as self-immolation.
Because after she died my tongue turned fire-
crisped log lagging behind my longing 
to rescue the too-hot words I care about.

Clear Thought

I've never moved with such anxious precision,

like I'm holding a moth cupped in my hands

and trying unlatch the door with my knee,

careful for myself, the moth.

There will still be days like this:

when I'm scrolling through vacuum cleaners,

kicking laundry round.

Seems likely now there will be many more,

when I'm moving tiles around 

the bedroom ceiling 

as tasks appear and are

locked with like,

so that if a row of them forms,

they disappear.

we traded seams
ran from the reef
to walk around with 
so much need 
in the red red night