may day

wind my flesh around the may pole, wring me out. an man regards his cell phone through lens of a red plastic pocket magnifier, a fat dog extends its wet nose to inspect the flowers. young girl kicks along on her scooter with one hand on the handlebars and the other over her left eye, while the right is squinting into the sun. at the park, a father has fallen asleep under the hot weight of his sleeping daughter. her hair is stuck sweaty to his skin and her small fingers around his neck are limp. smiling so sweetly, as though he knows where the devil waits, and the devil, today, is far.

-- so distant as to be very, very small.
no sleep and the world folds down from the top. walking home before dawn by the glinting canal, well? it wants to know, the coating of pollen thick on the water, how does it feel? do you feel? and i'm done smiling for now, so i just look at him sleepily, this man walking next to me, aware of his arms and of his feet. i can see the reflection of the street lamps in his teeth and kick some of the trash left over from everyone else's saturday night revelry.the white cover on my bed cradles like a cloud, in which my body tosses and kicks to no avail, the frustrated balletic of despondent insomnia. sleep will not come and i don't even believe in it. safe here, and i've grown familiar with the light corridors and wider expanses of solitude.
the long shadows getting closer
hide no knives in their folds,
only chilled air without promise.
don't ask me if you can come up
don't put your hand on the small of my back
don't smile like that
don't bare you glitter teeth at me
you're no home,
I want no heaven and no hell
i'm just taking a long visit
to the other side
of the widest lake
that i've hollowed in the core of longing