There’s a woman in town
who used to live in a treehouse
screaming as if in ecstasy
over the least thing:

green leaves, TV Guide
hologram covers, ecstasy itself.
She woke the whole neighborhood
once a night at least.

Finally,
cops were sent
to take her down.
She surrendered at once.

As she was led away she was asked
for some reason for what she’d done. She said,
“I was lonely, and I knew
someone would come sooner or later.”

All over town it’s the same:
people living like bulls, pent up
and chock-a-block
with fertility and anger.

Look past the keno screens
and poker runs. Past the turkey shoots
and meat raffles. Past the single cruiser on
a weeknight, the cop crying from boredom.

See that woman leap past it
from the treehouse
into the waiting arms
of someone to talk to.

See the red cape fall.
See everyone paying attention.
See the earth smoke underfoot.
See the way they chase their long-denied joy.

One:

it’s snowing, but not sticking. limited visibility past the parking lot. ink, meet paper; screen, meet font.

Two:

choosing your life is like flipping a foreign coin, seeing the result, then walking away. you know what you got, but you never learn what was on the other side.

Three:

if you turn a guitar amplifier’s gain control all the way up you’ll hear the air crackle in front of the grille. the guitar itself won’t bark till it’s stroked. stroke it; you’ll hear the air grate fuzz and shatter itself solid. a life is like that; built of broken symphonics that are lovely because they are broken.

Four:

on the edge of the parking lot is a path. no footsteps in it. slick as a flatwound string. frost’s kind of trail. stay off it; no amount of silver will buy your way back out again, and there’s more than enough literature out there about such roads.

when do you leave?