Brother I’ve been so weary as to not even go for the kopeks
in my pocket. Missed the bus twice that way.
A sight in uriny trousers.
(She never made it to meet; what was the point?)
This gets one to the point of “funny looking,”
at which point: look out!
No one wants to eat with you.
Let us forget, for one moment, the siddhas
who eat excrement for enlightenment.
We are not in that league.
We are busy with ignorance.
Furthermore, even if each yammering kook in the public reference
were yogic, I would not want my shirt back after lending it.
Lice are not my friends. I stay up late killing them,
having nothing to discuss.
Elsewhere I have a friend who is insanely beautiful
and largely based in suffering.
Suitors take their skiffs to her shore, but turn away
before disembarking on account of all the fish guts in the water.
I sympathize with all the creatures in this story.
from Union!Find more by Ish Klein at the library
Copyright © 2009 Ish Klein
Used with the permission of Canarium Books.