Waiting for the coffee to sink in
I am hauling up my mistaken identities,
but the pressure of air destroys them.
I walk to the kitchen with one

dirty cup. Bring. I place it in the sink
like an offering. Bring. The carpet snarls
at the bottom of the stairs. Bring
the edge we might find.

This that underneath pulses with the
earpiece’s carapace as the wallpaper
flocks, a light switches off in the eye.
Light puzzles at the window.

What the syllable says is
time catches its tail and leaves.
The room narrows and the windows focus,
the people under the tongue

take shape in my mouth.
On a sofa a child sits charging,
full of lifelessness.
He’s a shadow between

here and the clock in the house
next-door that strikes an
approximation of silence: air traffic,
the white goods, the time.