when I slit my eyes, out falls the hand,
asking in sign language: "why the razor?
why not a feather? or a lip? or a caramel mountain?
not even sleep now, just tingles and unclaimed static."
Oh, I know!  curious, you see, 
to hear the direction of the smell.
no less live, a clairvoyant rat scours the air
without cats or rats or air to scour,
diseased paws stomping through the mausoleum of cheese.
"I, a paw?  slanderous simian!  no paw
held her breast when the howl of love split the moon; no 
paw helped him lisp when the fist taught the swelling to bloom, 
no paw led the pen to condemn 
when the pack in attack did not swoon, no paw, but a delicate hand, 
with a leather-clad God for a groom!"
hmm, 
I wish I was married... what think you, 
my other eloquent appendages?
on, 
to the veins?

10.22.98