Look at me, carrying around
this beggar’s bowl, moaning
and holding my lower back. Spiders
run from me. Buzzards
circle me. The mirror
goes on strike and refuses to make
the same faces I’m making.
Even the pond surface won’t
take me seriously and ripples
itself instead of reflecting
such scowls. But listen,
I say, to no one, myself,
first he said this and then
I said … and the wind comes
from nowhere and shreds
my arguments. The vowels fall
out and disappear in the grass
and the consonants cluster
in a nearby tree until squirrels
come to steal them, one by one,
and store them in their nests
for safekeeping. Sometimes
a gal needs to shut up before
she can see clearly enough to notice
her bowl isn’t empty, it’s full.
Of light.