1
I’ll lay myself down in the mirror
when my hair is dry,
I’ll empty myself in the desert.
I’ll go flat in a cathedral’s ears,
tour the arteries of a broom,
bandage evergreens or cool the heels of a duck.

I’ll do anything to prove I’m working,
show up in shades and take to a machine
like a man counting bones,
swat calligraphers with my palms,
jerk the rope and start the engines of a dream,
pervert icecubes.

Only I won’t break blood vessels,
catch sleepers in a net of clocks
or bore holes in the walls of a leather jacket.

2
Rabbits tumble from the bottom
of a magician’s hat
scattering the stagefloor roaches
and staining the pine boards with rabbit cum.
Skyscrapers scrape runs in the delicate blue,
the ozone shield ruptures and communities melt
in the afternoon sun.

I have this job I’m doing, though,
and no one gets hurt.

Curves on the highway fly up into pigeons’ eyes,
packages take bathing suits from plastic dolls
and replace them with winter coats,
glue sputters in the dark drawers.
Action comix tear the gills from a bass.
Roto-rooters run for office in the constellations of the sewer.

I have this job I’m doing. though,
and no one gets hurt.

Paraprofessionals slit children open
to steal their money
while loudspeakers in the cafeteria
come down from their nails
and strangle the cook.
Goats stand together in a filthy yard,
doves worm their way into newspapers,
assemblymen pick their noses
and watch reefs of teachers go brittle
with the strain and the sadness of numbers.

I have this job I’m doing, though,
and no one gets hurt.

Pinecones bury signs in the lawns of new homes,
ordinances play in the sprinklers,
sand grinds the plumbing down
till you could toot the pipes like a flute,
nails squat in the ovens taking themselves for casseroles,
appliances shrink into blouses and fill with styrofoam pellets.

I have this job I’m doing, though,
and no one gets hurt.

3
It harms me to say people do nothing,
are nothing and pass from this life
into iron beneath the earth with no trouble.

Taxis drive into the river and no one cares,
a dozen people die in a storm of gunfire,
nothing changes.

Landscapers take their lunch
in the shade of a county truck
with figtrees all around for a mile,
the radio is tearing faces from a crazy magazine;
they understand it all,
the slander of squirrels,
the masochism of the telephone lines,
the boredom of the houses and of the sky,
the dogs snuffling each other
with savage tenderness,
the voices that shout and sell carpet
and keep it light between tunes.

Between tunes! The planet could split open
like a tomato between tunes,
friends could slam into a tree or go berserk,
unions could get up and lock the door
and go off by themselves to weep in an alley,
elephants could explode quietly at the zoo
with pennants and peanut bags flying everywhere,
railroads could roll up like wallpaper
and throw trains into wheatfields
among the carcasses of locusts and calves,
between tunes.