I think I know what he would say
about the dream I had last night
in which my nose was lopped off in a sword fight,

It’s a story as famous as the three little pigs:
one evening a man says he is going out for cigarettes,
closes the door behind him and is never heard from again,

I wish my head to appear perfectly round 
and since the canvas should be of epic dimensions, 
please trace the circle with a frisbee, 

As far as mental anguish goes,
the old painters were no fools.
They understood how the mind,

The ball at the center, visible
through the interstices of the lead webbing,
is composed possibly of jelly

Either they just die
or they get sick and die of the sickness
or they get sick, recover, then die of something else,
or they get sick, appear to recover,
then die of the same thing,
the sickness coming back 
to take another bite out of you
in the forest of your final hours.

The whole idea of it makes me feel 
like I’m coming down with something, 
something worse than any stomach ache 

I am trying to imagine that I am someone else,
a grocer, an aerialist,
a young viola player who travels
around the country in a bus full of musicians,

It is possible to be struck by a meteor
or a single-engine plane
while reading in a chair at home.

If you wanted flesh you had to wait
till second grade, for the box
of 64. Until then you outlined us