I am not my poem.

I am a 52-year-old trucker from Antigua. I frequent
lemur hospitals and pudding cups. On Wednesdays I
build straw men and on Fridays I douse them with rum.
The Sunday roast burns the pudding.

In Oslo, I became a cobbler. Your feet were bitten and
bare. Someone stole the bells. The straw man shattered
in the jaws of the ass.

Tomorrow I will drive home. Melting
is all that is left to do.

I will not become a poem. I am words. I did not write
this. You thought it and it appeared, naked as
the lemur. Bandaged. Broken. Silent.