River Body Identified
When I consider the river I see only myself stretched across the muddy floor, the horizon a pink curtain I can’t yank. Reeds bristle the bank like wild-haired children buried to their necks. Dragged, I’ll yield secrets: hypodermics, sunken backseats of cars, black garbage bags wound with cord, knives, an iron stove, mirror glass, annular humps of tires. Swollen, I purl under the ribbed cages linking flank to flank. The sun finds me bound for the salt wedge, licks another body’s cycle, a path- ologist’s debate: what time? cause? Too late.