was everywhere you looked:
was there in the cloud that looked like the omen of a fall
and the crack in the cement in Spanish Harlem
out of which nothing ever grew but a hopeful little bit of
hallucination.
He was the body of the fox on Bridgetown Road
donning its coat of flies and they’re still
buzzing there today.
He ran through brambles with the black bears
and dipped his big toe in the pond
where the runoff met the creek
and softly prodded the frogs to grow extra eyes and croak.
Like in Predator,
he slathered that young body in muck and lay
motionless in mire for hours when they came for him
all bug-eyed and ugly.
He never spoke
except with his eyes
and unless you were looking he’d
slip past you like blue smoke or burning sand
poured through your fingers or the sieve,
and one day when someone blinked through the dream
he disappeared.
It happened just as suddenly as he had arrived, like a flash of screaming lightning
or a heart attack.
