“He had been fired from that job because he had broken into the sacramental wine and rung the bells all night long.” — Henry Miller, TROPIC OF CAPRICORN

Defenestration is for real
It isn’t hard to find.
Obscured by curtains, needlework
The orange seeds and the rind.

Welcome you to my fair home,
Let me take your hat and coat.
Do you like your tea with vinegar?
How did you cross my moat?

No matter now, you’re here– hello!
I want to tell you true
To shine your shoes with porcelain tongue
Is something that I do.

I’m also good at standing still
And speaking very low.
I’d like to find a place where I
Can grow and grow and grow.

Gratitude is what I have
I mean stacks of it in spades
This job, this life, can cut me down
But all grass renews the blade.

I’m looking forward to our chat
I really need the job.
A secretary’s all you want
But that’s more corn than cob.

I hope you will excuse me now
Perhaps you haven’t heard.
Stay where you are, I just want to see
Through window flies the bird.

Here, I’ll open it right up
We’ll take a breath of air.
Have you ever known such life to pass
Without a single care?

I’ll just lean a little further
Though I want to hear you talk.
I must take in sun and tree and shade
And bark and bark and bark.

I’m glad that you could meet with me
And everything’s in order.
A bird that falls down from its nest
Is only testing borders.

Between here and now, between then and was
Between happiness and pain.
I think if we look closely now
Will find they’re all the same.