Homeless, USA

Hello, I don’t have a phone or access, either.

Hello, I crank the spit of life each & every day.

Hello, I’m related to you in some distant way,

as you are me, & I am you, on & on.

So, listen as nightingales of imagination glisten

the chimes on our tropical patios, chimes made

from varnished tarpon scales, chimes shaped

like synapses falling to their death, chimes like

hummingbirds flying from Jose Marzumillaga’s

baby grand, synapses reminding us that Zen

moments are the only moments we’ll ever have,

& once those moments vaporize like some light-

winged Dryad of the trees, once those moments

drift into the past tense, then we’re all homeless

until the very last one of us has a home to call

his or her own, every last one of us sheltered

peacefully in a home of our own.