I was thinking of the soul,
that lone sock lost in the wash
which my more pragmatic part
insists must exist someplace
waiting to be found

I was thinking of the sock,
of how it might disintegrate
slowly or all at once, a mist
of lint still clinging
to the screen
and how easily one might mis-
recognize this, its new form

I was thinking of what
matter is, and of what matters,
world without end,
no thing ever created
nor destroyed, only
transmuted, both soul
and mateless sock, into the next
unutterable thing

I never fight with anyone but me.
The rifts that roil this cell I wrought with my own hands.
Though another inmate’s face is what I see,
I never fight with anyone but me.
Any quarrel had with others is a plea
From the warden in me too, who understands
I never fight with anyone but me:
The rifts that roil this cell I wrought with my own hands.

It cups the custard, cradles the noodle.
I use it even when I don’t have to,
scoop under, then lift too too big a bite
to the need of my open mouth
which too for a moment becomes a spoon:
my tongue a curved wet shaving of want,
vehicle delivering a soupçon of what’s good
to all my yearning middle. Too,
some nights in a square of moonlight you
and I lie gleaming on our sides in bed
like silver in a drawer: discrete and neck to
neck, handle to handle, bowl to tiny bowl
brim full of just that bit which we can hold