[1] Bird sounds do not calm my marriage. I try their therapy. I caw and cough and drink. I breathe wings. I am inspired by the leaking light of my wife's talk. Already I am down feathers. Already I cry in dreams. Is falling its own kind of flight? Is the sad absence a permanence within the scrape? Ash and smog get along. A power hose that won't coil. The audience will see that all along it was an alligator. A vacant lot where God keeps incomplete drafts. I think of myself as a nail gun in a dust cloud. A puddle in a field getting a feel for the storm. You may ask yourself what is he getting on and I will tell you at a later date, I promise.

[2] Why is highway etiquette the absence of passing boats? I've been spending more time in my car. I see orange lights. I smile. They are close. The store down the street started selling handshake kits for us to practice and be ready when it's time. I'm trying to watch a documentary about birds but the hearse parked outside is eyeing my tabs, dabbing its brow, howling, fucking howling, like a morgue, like a drug.