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Sunset remains the same, the tilted earth,
the slanted autumnal sky.

My eyes mistake nothing.
The book in front of me is white & red.

Maybe, just maybe,
I'm the president at this moment

reading from a teleprompter,
except that I am reading my thoughts

as if they were significantly expanded;
grand architecture in a weary pathos.

Underwater, at sunset, the fish
feel less tempted, so they think.

Tempted fish, only those that resist
are happy; the other fish,

they meet their destiny with a snag.
Reeling, ranting, this is what poetry is!

the way nostalgia barks up
my eternal tree, exits out of me, enters

into another memory that I have yet
to run into, but is soon to be revealed

where even the wind cannot reach.
Remembering certain girls, like the wind,

a frizz, a fragile gleam in their sparkle.
I have always wanted to say to each of them:

"I am not supposed to know your secrets
but your eyes keep revealing them to me."

Snag! baseless substitutions of reminiscing,
like substituting color, the way a school bus

drives by, or was it only the bright yellow sun
running laps? Or a starry sky reminding me

of reaching into an old, fragile jewel box
with eyes closed, feeling for the spores

of a time long past. These thoughts free me
from an atmosphere containing oppression,

containing an always-aching mother--
back-aches for the feverish. And here,

I lay out the "slaughter rule" & kiss
another day goodbye.