A fire truck goes by‚
  On its way to the station
With a low roar‚

I could laugh, but instead a kind of pity
finds me, compels me actually to pray,

this face, these hands. I’ve lived too long underground.
My eyes cannot fix on the distance

How easily I teased these pins from her
robes once. Coaxing each one out with my mouth,

Bewildered, he looks at her. She moves closer,
touches his cheek, whispers, what’s lost is ours,

Drawing draws us in-
volving us further and stretching
attention it sketches reaching

Precisely this
        afflicts the plagiarist,
or something like

What if givenness isn’t enough—
and the wind’s slithering along my arm
is really a subtle summery alarm

I’m tired of life and its troubles.
Whoever lives as long as I have or will
grows weary: it’s inevitable.

We hurl ourselves over
      then over again
into the wall