there are plenty of things unlike people
I can grab ahold of
that will not let me down.

that big mound of snow in the corner of that parking lot
is a good girlfriend for starting over with.
I'll make love to it like I used to kiss my pillow, practicing.
I'll thrash around on dirty white until
something connects with something.
I'll hit the pavement like an egg.
I'll pick up the colors revealed
with their budding circuitry aborted.

The world doesn't have to be made flesh
to make me yearn.
I'll frame it as a steaming image
with the part of me that can't believe
my own ability to breed.

I got this apartment for the winter
because I wanted a place with a window
looking out on that empty parking lot.
At night the plows make it shiny and clean with long
surging kisses. When the cars fill it up
in the morning I feel like I'm about to cry.
The form is so much better than the function.

I got this apartment because I wanted to believe
in my ability to live without
the company of total strangers.
I got this apartment because I didn't want
to get anyone pregnant. It looked at me
from among the classified ads
like an eye looking through flames,
just as desperate as myself, and more open:

single man seeks single woman
to remain single with;
single woman must be non-smoker;
must be

himself

pressing against an empty bed,

rehearsing both parts.