I press against my stream of calculations, I am not this. I am not this. I have weight on my
feet. I have breath. I pour a cup of coffee I will place in front of anyone and say, Here you
go. But I am anxious for the day when I will sum up how I’ve done. I didn’t get in the
way much; nothing important was my; fault; I got through to endless nothing. I die
solvent and slender. I made it. The man I serve shows me a picture of his granddaughter,
and I smell bleach. From his skin? From my hand, from the rag I used an hour ago to
wipe the table.
Killarney Clary‘s fourth book of prose poems is “Shadow of a Cloud but No Cloud,” published by the University of Chicago. She lives in Aptos, California.
*Image courtesy Library of Congress.
