the tail of an ass to drag the muddy lanes.
But the ass stands rooted in a ditch,
shredding weeds with a ripping sound.
Up on the wall, a woman works the crowd,
making the rounds with a steaming sack of corn.
People buy a roasted ear for warmth,
holding it snug inside their hands for a long while
before peeling back the damp husk.
It was not yet light.
I heard my father stir.
I crept downstairs
in my pajamas to listen
as he sent my brother
to find his spirit animal:
If it is a crow it is a crow,
and you will not go hungry.
I want it to be a bear
or a wolf, my brother said.
If it is a crow it is a crow,
murmured my father.
The door whuffed shut
and cold ascended the stair.
After a long moment
I walked into the kitchen
where my father sat.
I want to seek mine, I said.
Your what? he asked.
My spirit animal, I said.
He laughed and pointed
to the broom closet.
Check in there, he said.
Maybe the mop bucket
will be able to teach you
how to hold your water.
Very funny, I whispered.
My father shrugged,
What do you expect?
You’re a closet Slovakian,
and your brother is simple.
Last week at the library
he checked out the phonebook.
As my father spoke,
I heard the staccato
footfalls of my brother
and his curious gait.
The door burst open
with a gust of cold:
A bus! he said. Huge
as the sperm whale!
The mirror of my soul
is a crosstown bus!
My father smiled,
Good for you, Jeffrey!
His face was frank
as an open sail. Then
he looked at me and
mouthed these words:
The steam that blows the whistle
never turns the wheel.
Now that I am a man,
I can clearly recall
how snow sifted sideways
through the air, how
I never had a brother,
how my father yearned
to be elsewhere, how
I longed to board that
crosstown bus and sit
quiet in the weak light,
using a stubby pencil
to draw the curious
members of my new
family, smiling there
on those paper napkins.
Your humor is deft and cutting
my fingers off one by one,
she said as we left the party.
I started up the car and said:
Every joke holds one blade inside
the breast pocket of its coat
to open things and liberate
the world of unremembered light.
This exchange took place without words.
A snowbank leapt into the headlights.
The car seemed to know the way home.
Until that moment I had been waiting
to put my mouth over her mouth
and breathe the ferment of the evening.
This might have led to touching
the soft parts of our bodies together.
Instead we fell asleep, tongues
heavy in our mouths like fish.
When They Meet, They Can’t Help It
His obsession is a cart drawn by muscled oxen
over rain-softened
