(scent of pain
painting houses all day i don’t talk)


the phone rings brings a voice dislocated
without form or desire

you're plastic
the phone tells you what to say how to touch


in their urgency suicides talk little
time spreads out color of jam

bus rides to dreams at point zero
houses zip by bleed


a Moroccan man leans
forth to show a vial of perfume from his country
its trees & earth encapsulated


Mong-Lan
originally published in Quarterly West