Two O'Clock

i am not home
and the coffee in the machine is stale already
my staple remover    has teeth
sings to me    even though it was supplied to me
by the office

o aria
o i feel my head floating with your song
the desk's    grey    barrenness
like a dead ocean on a dead planet
and my desk calendar
like an iceberg that still has it together to glitter

the clock is like a sun
a two-dimensional ball
and just before the long hand reaches the twelve it clicks
every hour    above the prattling of the dot matrix printer
i hear it:    the music of the spheres

from Purgatorial (2004)

The Poodles

we didn't mind when they put in the cubicles
and supplied the snack bar
only with sugar and fat

we didn't mind the
ergonomic chairs and leg irons

we didn't mind the
intravenous caffeine
or the brain surgery

we do
though
complain how those poodles strut
when they bark to us about our quotas
and how they pee
at the corners of our enclosures

we complain
but they never do anything
about it

from Purgatorial (2004)