angie estes

Seven

(It had been a rainbow of waves: indigo, azure, teal, aqua, turquoise,

lavender and white. Maybe periwinkle.)

White towels, wadded on the stainless steel.

(Which had stained.)

Mr. Agenda straightens his tie.

Nothing, anymore, is warm.

(Derangement was about to be a national condition.

Therefore, the so-called “bake and reside.”

Tense grew rather tense

and strained. Made no “sense.”)

Nine

Or Mrs. Bovary’s growing addiction to fabric:

Adopt a title instead of a name—

all else follows.

Mrs. Bovary: title plus “sur” name of someone else—

name “above” a name.

Back-end linkage to some family dynasty

or other, plug-in to the vertical, over time.

Where does “Emma” go, then?

(Like a secret password, such as “token”—)

Meanwhile, all we really have

is the daily horizon.

(It does not occur to me, at first, what the tapping is—

the tapping we call “rain.”

  

I don’t recognize my headache

as a kind of hunger.)

holaday mason