the garage in T-shirts. Today

the first snow on a wind of

—in this political climate—malice.

Teeth, spit, and red gums—the cops

in hand-me-down DOD gear

swing swift the black batons,

riot shields flashing, the sun a white hole

above us. The rupture,

the false rapture—you milking pepper spray

from your beautiful eyes, one blue-green

the other hazel, the first pool I

drowned in in order to live.

2.

A toddler’s lost

red glove, found when last year’s gray

snowbank faded, its match long since tossed

and rotting, I imagine, for decades more

in a landfill—some metaphor for the soul and

its dream. Therefore, you and me.

And our boy, who brings a kaleidoscope to his eye,

twists the cylinder,

and what was certainty is now

shards and flecks of stars,

bits of mirror

to make a world from.