Considering a future husk—the disappearance
of a silkworm—I remake you, domestic
moth, downy and felted, almost artificial. Striking
against glass, tapping music—
I am steeped in aroma, you behind
a hallway’s closed door—mercurial tubular bells, petulant
horns, threshing floor dust and fibers. Might this be the ghost
I’d deform you into knocking between the floorboards? Thing
of pearls and velvet, to be pinned across
my rough flax—decadence brewed
in bit and yoke and cream. Instead,
you are alive, nibbling on, unsatisfied,
some mushroom gravy, too bland and as tidy as
another century’s calligraphic script. What do we make
but our daily dinner. Serve me—
cabbage soup and crackers.
