Rae Armantrout

 

Confidential

Shooting pleasures   

Ok’d by

My being seen

For

Or as

If.

                   *

Not just light

at the end of the tunnel,

but hearts, bows, rainbows—

all the stickers

teachers award if pleased.

                   *

Pigeons bathe in technicolor   

fluid “of a morning.”

                   *

If I was banging

my head with a shoe,

I was just exaggerating—

like raising my voice   

or the ante.

Curlicues

on iron gratings:

Can it be

a flourish is a grimace,

but a grimace isn’t a flourish?

                   *

On the inscribed surface

of sleep.

Almost constant   

bird soundings.

“Aloha, Fruity Pebbles!”

Music, useful

for abstracting emphasis.

Sweet nothing   

to do with me.