the chinese chef laughs in the silver mirror.  i check the walls for any sign of
home.  i could be in an airport, i could be leaving your city

tonight.  the light has touched my swollen eyes, soft and uncertain—
weeping insect wing.  oh, little darling

i am nothing but words, trudging through a chocolate lake
the chant of the damned in a concentration camp.  my back is breaking

hooked through the weight of you
when we grinned, i saw the finish line.

they ask for my passport now.  my carcass stares
i glance at it and repeat:  i do not know her.

but i will always recall our warm-wine laughter, your city
lunging high on painted black stilts, it

grows smaller now, a joke, a tale, a few lines of song
sizzling, crumpled visions of white.  it is your city

and flippantly, it leaves marks on my shoes as if to say:  forget-me-not.
together once, i was alive with you.