As I was saying

Pretend nothing bad's happening, pretend you learned new definitions for age-old monikers. Fuck the world. (Guess who bought Open Secrets by Alice Munro, The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith, and Ignorance by Milan Kundera?) Shoot. (Today is the absolute last, I swear. I needed something to do during that mind-slooshing wait in that stark white room. I conveniently forgot to bring a book with me.)


*


The Quiet World
by Jeffrey McDaniel

In an effort to get people to look
into each other's eyes more,
the government has decided to allot
each person exactly one hundred
and sixty-seven words, per day.

When the phone rings, I put it
to my ear without saying hello.
In the restaurant I point
at chicken noodle soup. I am
adjusting well to the new way.

Late at night, I call my long
distance lover and proudly say
I only used fifty-nine today.
I saved the rest for you.

When she doesn't respond, I know
she's used up all her words
so I slowly whisper I love you,
thirty-two and a third times.
After that, we just sit on the line
and listen to each other breathe.


*


P. gave me a classicized Eeyore the Emo Donkey, among other things. (In compensation: he got himself a blow torch, for Chrissakes.) Here's hoping Moosebert doesn't act up. But the newly christened Eeyorebert is so goddamned awesomely puking cuteness, it's disintegrating quite a lot of brain cells, and I fucking love everything.