Creature

9781844710287

1844710289

Creature's Introduction I'm told I'm one in a series. Anonymous messages arrive in the mail Detailing factory rebates And opportunities for extended phone lines. I search in vain for posters bearing my likeness. The answers I receive on the street Tell me that I must have been altered. The photographs I take turn up blank. If I speak deferentially and stare At the ground, eventually someone Calls my name. I never can tell what they're thinking. Sometimes I wonder am I thinking at all. But I'm no reprobate. I am no throwback. Standing in line I hear people laugh. I go out running under stars. I improvise rhythms on the trees. A world unto myself, I'm no one's champion, And I never could please my woman. Perhaps this is why she went away, hopped On a motorcycle with a scrawny, tattooed man Who fired her into my worst memories and dreams. Now I caress only the wall. When I answer the phone, no one speaks- Only distant sounds like interstellar clicks. I do not recall what language I am. Long ago I lost the ability To associate faces and smells. The boys at the bar give me drinks as I leave. I go walking the alleys at night And ransack garbage cans for keepsakes-a bracelet, A crowbar, a picture of a man watching the sky. The brand of airplane I like was discontinued. I walk into churches in the late afternoon And linger to inhale the smoke of votive candles. The boss props me against a wall Until he needs me to make deliveries Or sandblast another table and chairs. There go the bells again, the crack in the hour A cynical note, three in the morning already.