That’s a hot dog with fried onions 
(the kind that come in a can) and stripes 
of brown mustard and mayo. We each 

Slicked
    with a birther’s goo, it 
    gleams up green from the ground— 

That there’s a fun in funeral 
is goofus etymology, but a sensible reminder 
of the secret life in everything . . . how inside dear

Out of the darkness, men come 
     with knives. They work quickly, 
muttering back and forth. 

One last stop, he says. And they drive to Westside Lanes. 
I grew up bowling. I don’t want to bowl. It was raining. 
We’re not going to bowl, the circus carpet dark with gum 

Not too old, not young anymore, 
almost three dozen years gone by. 
Not a failure, not a success— 

This is what it’s like at the end of the day.
But soon the day will go away.

A shiver of lightning buckles the sidewalk.
Love cracks my sternum open

The second woman shines my shoes.
The other takes my order, curtsies. Thank you, sir.
Others stand there in the rain so I can mount them when I choose.

I walk on water in my poems, using the lily pads
Of the sidewalk homeless as stepping-stones.