Something Vagabond Strokes the Furnance

The skull, when it’s not whistling
like a kettle, is stocking up
on unshelved tremors: We can only unfold
the map and search out A Storm
Is Coming. Before that there’s shouting
OhLaLa in the convertible, scratchy music.
I too liked the volume turned up.
Her eyes closed, taking in
being taken care of:
a flash bulb went off inside her.
The light sizzled then went out.
Not only the detached private parts,
but word choices. They were shot glasses
on escalators. The mind is a fracus
with bristles: The tongue a series of pauses.
In reality, if you can imagine in reality,
we short out every couple of minutes.
I’m lost, are you? I think of the sky as property.
And what I like about the primitive, exotic,
under-the-dress-part, is just a sentence or two:
we had Milton in Sunday School: no need for Dante.

Ira Sadoff
Something Vagabond Strokes the Furnance first appeared in The American Poetry Review.