Produce, Bear, Surrender

Any ache can bleed but when
the milkless breasts’ green cabbage leaves
cannot staunch the quickening decay
of daisies in an over-exposed
educational film on entropy
you can stick your fingers in your ears all you want
but the gull-loud grief will keep shining
like headlights through curtains
in the front room. Seated inside,
a row of jawbones set so tight
hairline fractures splinter like thin ice. Keep your
lantern nearby, for when the lake goes dark
there will be no mercy, no sound loud enough
for any nearby noctuary to hear, let alone
record in their oily logbook. O, brave one,
dare to peer over the desk, the deck,
dare to ask the unseen question
only the raccoon on the roof can answer.
While your knees knocked the night sky
made shadow thieves steal household goods and
you upstaged the whole damned police department.
How long has your vagus nerve wandered,
searching for the womb that wouldn’t.
X marks the spot: here. Here is where it hurts.