a homely word:
a plosive, a long cry, a quiet stop, a silent letter
          like a storm and the end of a storm,

How much the colonel loved his granddaughters
you will never know.
                           Their laughter filled his black Mercedes

You’re born that way—or else you’re not.
It’s snowing—or else it’s hot.
It’s like the strangeness, that’s also natural,

I live a life of appetite and, yes, that’s right,
I live a life of privilege in New York,

even higher
among the oaks
there is nothing but oaks

we had climbed up the mountain
towards the colossal figure of the temple
now reduced to ruins

The long day has ended in which so much
And so little had happened.

Bad luck, my very own, sit down and listen to me:
You make yourself scarce for months at the time

I’m the uncrowned king of the insomniacs
Who still fights his ghosts with a sword,

It pains me to see an old woman fret over
A few small coins outside a grocery store—