Sage Calder Hahn
Saprotrophic
I am grasping at the black cat
sniffing his own tail on the
front deck. He’s got eyes like real people
and eats mushrooms that grow in rings.
At night I cannot sleep.
The moon peering over half-trimmed trees,
the undulation supposed to soothe me.
My doctor told me once, to throw salt
over my left shoulder, in a full moon.
It was meant to starve the wart on my right
knee, but I’ve had visions three years since.
A house on fire. A dead bird, which I found on my windshield
the next morning. Drops of rain pooling in his open beak.
They are plain things.
Thank you doctor.
No, I have not been back there since I can remember.
They say under mushrooms fairies dance. Maybe
the cat eats those too.
We Were Born
I could not wait any
longer I wrote about
you. You in your car
singing Sinatra.
Today is my day for
starvation and I eat
one apple, ribbed
mostly green before
sunrise. In this way
I am God and not
the crow – holy,
resisting desire
to circle the un-
married corpses
of squirrels on
the road. I
watch the pines
at their tips, the
way nobody can
see them.
In November we
have one weekend.
There is only so
much to say
about wanting
you. Every
day I think
about your
arms in the
flannel shirts
you buy from
Wal-Mart where
I sometimes
roam the aisles
hoping to run
into your
warmth again
and be nervous.
The halogen does
this to every
body. Phone
call, 2am you
ask the question
I have been
waiting to be
asked. When I
answer, you rest
in it, the way I
wish you could rest
in my stomach –
the soft inward
curve of a bowl
made in pottery
class – hand thrown,
my fingers twisting
clay, not knowing
the churn of up and
down. It is not
something you
will teach me.
I am waiting for
something simple
to come. I
ask you the name
of the flowers in
your hand, you do
not know them.
Why would you?
Papaver somniferum.
I went to college for
things like this. I
hoped you would
love me for
leaving, you,
in your car
singing Sinatra, I
could not wait
