My body needs something to be wrong.    You 

filled me 

like a cup        and then you 

left. I scrub mouse blood

from the baseboards. I scrape frozen bird shit        

from the front door.    

The smell of death lifts 

up the walls:        small animals wanting in. 

An orange cat tosses a rag of a rabbit, whiskers it 
    with claws. 

If you knew how the body can clench     

and hold:        a quickening

of the guts and lungs. 

I once had succulents—the man 
    who broke 

in smashed them from the windowsill, and now I 

eat a little less, a little
    less not because I want 

to be a light bulb but because I need                to be a lantern. Forever

winter, the sky looks cold, pink as a clot                                    in the mouth.