my mother asks me to write a poem in which I am alive at the end
& it looks like rain.
Yard thrush empty.
Damp.
Sidewalks absent of
dog-walkers
& bikers.
A hornet burrows
under the flaked siding.
Metallic wings fluttered
cold
& moist.
& it looks like rain,
my
partner says.
Sky oozed sun,
bright
still.
Roof
drum tap with the patter.
Clouds not even trying
to look nasty.
My hand pressed
against the screen -door,
mesh squaring
my palm.
& it cleans like rain.
Streets swept free
of
garbage:
Fast
food bags stutt er ing
on the sewer
grate.
& it tastes like rain.
Air
seeping,
coating my lungs full.
Tongue dried soil,
now wet.
& it smells like rain.
A church of
petrichor.
The worship of thrumming nostrils.
& it looks like anything.
Anything
& the swaying
shimmer of
droplets.
prions
Two scoops
of protein powder.
A cup of almond
milk & water.
Shaken. Blender ball
dispersing the protein.
& as I shake,
I am reminded of Kuru,
of Fatal Insomnia.
Of last night’s
google
to feel something.
Listen,
I am numb to viruses,
numb to
bacteria, fungi
just another
white tongue
coating to me,
just debris.
Parasites so alien
but grey,
bulbous head, known.
But those diseases
that spring from protein.
Mmmm.
& my heart pulses
across the rib rage.
How something
so basic
can be deadly.
Such a centerpiece
to our structure.
How misguided,
misfolded our bodies
can become.
