the backstroke of the west

the chinese chef laughs
in the silver mirror
i check the walls for any sign
of home
i could be in an airport, i
really don’t know
i am leaving your city tonight

this morning, i remember
peanut butter and jelly like
marble on my toast
i woke up with swollen eyes
soft and uncertain
weeping insect wing

and maybe i am nothing but
words, trudging through
the chocolate lake
the chant of the damned
in a concentration camp
my back is breaking
under the weight of you
when we grinned, i saw the finish line

i think, you are selfish i think
you are proud i think you’re a liar
i think you are loved
but we’ll see, we’ll see
they ask for my passport
my photograph stares though i scold
it and repeat: his heart has died

but you know, i will always
recall the warm-wine thursday
encased in crystal
we laughed til we cried and
around us, your city lunged
higher on painted black stilts

it grows smaller now, a joke
a tale, a few lines of song
crunched, crumpled visions of white
it is your city, and flippantly, it
left marks on my shoes as if to say: forget-me-not,
together once
i was alive with you