after Archibald MacLeish
Don’t you dare tell me who I should be my intentions palpable as armpit
hair but never mute you devour my globed fruits dumb as Snow White
or Eve and Adam they’re leaving I’m releasing shard by shard listen
my birds aren’t wordless aren’t worthless busy warbling the blues
unfiltered like maple sap runny yolk pancake batter
leaking through a lonely doorway no one’s here to clap
for the mind hoards memory contra Fort Knox
retreating in time as a night-engulfed silverfish
you hand over that rhetorical earring
coyotes yodeling behind the fence
where love leans down
and grief helps
make spaghetti
slippery
—Alistair Lam