Sunlight fades
the storefront full of magazines.
Month to month
they boss us — the covers,
they tell us
that if we want to get happy & alluring
(real happy, alluring sexually)
we must for goddamn sure
take up the breeding of Jack Russell terriers,
or else dig
ourselves
a little backyard fishpond.
Days of fish, days of dog, days of sex —
in that order, necessarily.
In the sun
all the titles are trying
to vanish — phrases like trout pond
diluted, the 20-point sans serif, inked-red
passion bleached now, apathetic, ghostly —
words that want my attention
like movers on the street lugging mirrors,
a moment when I seem to
come toward myself & then
I’m gone
too. I am not
a greedy man. All I want
is to be a visitor to this life.