share


Sleepwalking through the Mekong

I have my hands out in front of me.

I’m lightly patting down everything

I come across. I somehow know the

banana shake when I touch it.

 

I can see myself from above.

As if on a video monitor.

Why?

 

I travel slowly down every alley,

across every rice paddy,

into and through every bedroom,

into and through every closet.

I am asleep and yet I am polite.

 

electronica

 

rain showers

 

It is always like this.

I wear a light brown suit.

When I come upon you I grope you

for what seems like ten minutes.

As you have noticed.

But I am excused because I am asleep.

It is understood I am harmless.

I am like a blind reverend.

I am like a politician.

A ten-year-old girl detains me

in the park. She carefully clips

each of my fingernails.

 

When I yawn the earth rumbles.

I pat cans in your pantry.

It is said sparks can be seen

coming from my briefcase.

But I do not carry a briefcase.

I am not like that.


ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTOR

is an American poet from Livingston, Montana. He is the author of Can You Relax in My House, Yes, Master, and Thin Kimono.

READ NEXT

feature

July 2012

Ways of Submission

Saskia Vogel

feature

July 2012

On a pale marble fountain in Dubrovnik, I posed. I pretended I too was a stone figure, water gushing...

Interview

March 2011

Interview with DBC Pierre

Ben Eastham

Interview

March 2011

DBC Pierre first came to the attention of the world with the publication of Vernon God Little in 2003. This...

fiction

May 2012

Hunt for American Heiress Continues...

Seraphina Madsen

fiction

May 2012

Hunt for American Heiress Continues With Bizarre Manuscript Found in Cave in Altamira By ALICE SHIFT 7:00 AM ET...

 

Get our newsletter

 

* indicates required