Autobiography

 

 

1.

For a fraction of a moment,

this layered barcode                     of homespun wisdom:
a pinch of salt

to keep new jeans   from dimming; kitty litter
in a tied-up sock

to maintain an unfrosted             interior

overnight front windshield. A remote source
of any Ottawa winter.

 

2.

A statement as quick                   as the human heart.

Adept                     , and sensible,
we brace       against steel. Since I am background,

foreground, empty. Both pleasure and displeasure,
we revise, reorganize. Amend.

Wordle: of the day            , I’m dead.

 

3.

Monday morning’s tempest                   of circulated
January air. Christine

isolating in the girls’ room , solo            having
tested Covid-positive. Both of us boosted

, parenthetical.                             Day three

of a potential five.  

 

4.

They say there is a language

for every season. Solitude, soluble. A trick

of the eye.    How a telescope can capture light

estimated                at some fourteen billion years.
Adnan: I need to circle the mountain,

because I am water.                     As she knew then:

because this continues to be                  about who remains,
and who                 might still advance. And what

the difference.