Bald man smoking in bed,
Naked lightbulb over his head,
The shadow of his cigar 

the fundamental equation
of an empty street
in a rundown neighborhood

Stalin was killing off his fellow revolutionaries,
The first Dairy Queen opened in Kankakee, Ill.,
As I lay in my crib peeing in my diapers.

You’ve been paying visits
To that hunchbacked tailor
In his long-torn-down shop,

What I hate are short winter days,
Cold and snowless afternoons,

and you shudder
as you realize it’s only you

Sat up
Like a firecracker
In bed,

This couple strolling arm in arm
Must be figments of someone’s revery.
They stop often to linger over a kiss,

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

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