Excerpt from Sad Little Breathing Machine

INTRODUCTION TO THE WORLD

For the time being
call me Home.

All the ingenues do.

Units are the engines
I understand best.

One betrayal, two.
Merrily, merrily, merrily.

Define hope. Machine.
Define machine. Nope.

Like thoughts,
the geniuses race through.

If you’re lucky

after a number of
revolutions, you’ll

feel something catch.


FIRST PERSON FABULOUS

First Person fumed & fizzed under Third Person’s tongue while Third Person slumped at the diner counter, talking, as usual, to no one. Third Person thought First Person was the toilet paper trailing from Third Person’s shoe, the tiara Third Person once wore in a dream to a funeral. First Person thought Third Person was a layer of tar on a gorgeous pink nautilus, a foot on a fountain, a tin hiding the macaroons & First Person was that nautilus, that fountain, that pile of macaroons. Sometimes First Person broke free on first dates (with a Second Person) & then there was the delicious rush of “I this” and “I that” but then no phone call & for weeks Third Person wouldn’t let First Person near anyone. Poor First Person. Currently she was exiled to the world of postcards (having a lovely time) -- & even then that beast of a Third Person used the implied “I” just to drive First Person crazy. She felt like a television staring at the remote, begging to be turned on. She had so many things she wanted to say. If only she could survive on her own, she’d make Third Person choke on herself & when the detectives arrived & all eyes were on her, she’d cry out, “I did it! I did it! Yes, dahlings, it was me!”


EVERYTHING MUST GO

Today’s class 3-Deifying:
Godgrass, Godtrees, Godroad.

A sheet of geese bisects the rainstorm.
The water tower is ten storms full.

We practice drawing cubes –
that’s the house squared away

& the incubator with Baby.
The dead are in their grid.

O the sleeping bag contains
the body but not the dreaming head.

Copyright 2004 by Matthea Harvey. All rights reserved.