We sit under the same glass
umbrella beneath the dripping stairs
and wish for stars
over a calm ocean—

no wind to tell on our motion
toward each other.

We sit above the same filthy
platform over the third
rail and wish
to be spared

another breakdown.
We ruin everything

in all directions
till the rumble wakes us to stand
and consider what Claude would say
about the crowd’s breath now.

Please don’t ask me
to drive you home.
Please don’t tell me
where you live.

Please don’t get lost
on those winding roads on a bitter
cold evening. I used to transpose
wind chills and windshields.

Please don’t tell me
how to drive. I drove for hours
through the streets of New York
in my dream last night.

Please don’t laugh. No, I didn’t
crash. Yes, I closed my eyes
when I couldn’t see
what lay beyond

the next bend. Yes, I know
New York streets don’t bend.

Please don’t ask me
to turn up the heat
in the cab of the old pickup
parked in the back.

Please don’t tell me
I’m hot. Only I know

how I feel. Please don’t ask
for my number. Cell reception sucks
in the middle of an evergreen forest—
or a nightmare.

How will she know when
to stop running?

If the temperature drops below zero,
what happens to the ornaments
on the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree?

Why does that tree make her sob
and dream of Old Tjikko standing alone
on its Swedish mountain?

What happens when they say it’s too cold
to snow? Who do they think they are

to spread fake news to those boys and girls
looking for a glimmer of hope
on a January night in International Falls?

How can she greet other loners
on the trail tomorrow
with her lips and arms frozen in place?

How many myths have gotten trapped
beneath the frozen surface of that lake?

How do night ice fishermen hook them
to use to swap tall tales
while for they wait for the walleye to bite?

Will she smell the black ice
when she comes down the hill?

What does the fish smell
as it swims long distance
in the middle of its school?

The bridge’s reflection on the water
in the low light
tastes tart to her this time.

If no one waits for you
on the other side of the screen,
then wooden box
means coffin not confessional.

If no one says no to a child
who tampers with ornaments
on a cafe railing,
then there’s the mind
of another sex offender
in the making.

If her sister discovers a new geometry
in bold primary colors,
then she will hold the numbers
securely in her fist.

Then she will keep walking
city sidewalks
till she finds the perfect kelp forest
to release them into.

Then forget restraint.
Throw Bowie
in the lab.
Then push Neil deGrasse Tyson
onto the stage
without a telescope.

If she won’t look in the mirror
on this trip,
then she won’t see
the stars scorching

everywhere—trapped
the way she is
on a #7 train stuck in a tunnel
beneath the East River.

If five years
is a long time
to go without
seeing a real monster,

then a watched Apple
installation progress bar
won’t get bolder
even as an unbearable tartness
begins to tease
the tongue.

If a harpsichord burns
in a yard in England,
then it will first warn us to pause
beneath a single note flame.

Then a radio emergency
alert system
will flood the eardrums
till a scratching on the screen door
fades under manual typewriters clicking
in a row in an empty room.

Then the ocean will beckon outside
as marching boots on wet pavement
get closer and a train
passes overnight

before breaking open
to crickets as they stir
in a rock pile fence
on a hot morning

that spills into a liquid cool
afternoon over a worn hammock
then burrows into a night sky
that a paper hole punch
has transformed
into an eyelet shawl

so that tiny discs
of atmosphere and cobalt blue
dreams can drift downward
as snowflakes
that have no longer
lost their way.

If / then
wire strings
will melt
our wayward myths.

one minor
one too many cocktails
enough rumors

to match each one
end to end

she thought she was
the lucky one
on your mind

after hours
how could she know

your footprints
collecting
in the sand

like so many
coupling then uncoupling
pairs of plastic bottles

left on the beach
at low tide
to float out to sea

to disturb
the balance
of life

no matter how you spin it
slips of paper passed
hand to hand

do they do it
that way anymore

she thought those lemon wedges
perched on the lips
of highball glasses

meant you would survive
the black magic spells
cast over your heads

you would wiggle
through gaps
in the net

to land on kelp beds
positioned perfectly
to cushion your fall

how could she know
you would use your Bowie knife
to cut the flax grid

deforesting
everything below

a sandbar scuffle
in the Mississippi not Atlantic
to blame

not achilles but deeper
where we travel together
along ice and hard-packed snow
on an island in the middle
of the Mississippi
boom

you have complained some
about the weather
more precisely
barometric pressure
now we stretch and wish
those others would join us

success without daydreaming
does not compute
never stop tracking
the teacher
even when
he’s dead

your grandmother’s house
is too small
to store all her memories
she was born into
to walk the sidewalks
no longer an organ grinder

turns out
we are the invasive species
that no shuttered lock
can prevent
from spreading
downriver or uphill

you share my anxiety
for the comma
gone rogue

that expired
New Jersey Transit schedule
I jammed under a leg
to a chest
of drawers
has been there for years

I needed something
to balance my life
as my father slowly evaporated

he was a marathon
of years
older than me

you want me to use
geophagy in a poem
before it’s too late
to run two loops around
Central Park
one more time

no matter how many
of my birthdays pass
as anniversaries
of my father’s birth
the number 8
upright or napping is ours

as the sun sets
the Earth shrieks
rings of blood red
sends waves of anxiety
passing through its layers
to burst from its crust

when I walk outside
wearing headphones
I cannot know if I have begun

to hum uncontrollably
cannot know if it’s that
or a dark sky
piercing scream
that paints horror
on people’s faces

and I do smile
sometimes while I run
despite what you think