“You must change your life,” says Rilke,
and I repeat it every morning, holding my own
wan gaze in the mirror. Wetting my hair,
then letting it Cthulhu—first one way,
then another, around a finger. Other
advice I give myself: “You must stop dating
physicists, that sere barnacling across
the cold, leeward faces of rocks.
You must stop sleeping on the floor;
though good for your back, it’s not good for
your forward (your future, mind you).”
I walked home cradling a brown paper bag. Inside, blood oranges tousled like planets in an orrery.
Similarly—
an ordinary hour orbited.
