by Jeff Clark

    This morning in an alleyway I was startled by a face

    I seemed to recognize， in a dormer above a garage

    and so slunk up to him， who was ranting¹ quietly，

    mauling the mind of some imagined ear out the pane²

    as if maligned³， or high， like one

    moony and almost witless in a poppy ditch，

    or one waking ill and supine

    in a wet bed of opening mullein：

    "I have no desire to theorize language——

    I was raised modestly and have sinned unspeakably.

    I would rather waylay⁴ and destroy

    whose voice molests⁶ me."

    On his desk a thin book I knew， a tragedy

    whose residue⁷ was a Sentry's couplet I half-knew

    and began to recite——startling him who turning was outwardly

    unknown to me——， "'Does it hurt in your ears——'"

    "Fuck Antigone——I detest⁸ language， I detest artifice⁹，

    I would rather waylay and molest⁵

    the beast that has imagined and pent me here."