Cecil Muttershead, 1D

Everyone else's window garden succeeds.
Their kitchens, polished between stove
and counter, are stacked
with bright packages. Their dreams
are caught with one pretty leg in a snare,
rushing and pushing them
unaware through a day.

My dreams are vicious, full of blunt
teeth. They wax, fade, buckle,
brim over. I don't know how to gnaw
through the paste.
They land like cracked rock
swept into window pits. Let me be

these dreams for my next life,
make my living leaving
some human beaten down
like a street. Make my living
running my fingers through
their bodies.

I wish I could touch my brain.
I wish, for that matter, I could
rummage through my chest
cavity, reach out to those tight-fitting
balls and slabs and feel.

Whatever my dreams give me, there
is much to thank my ribcage for.
Whatever my garden gives,
there is always the blue heart,
bright as a clown, that pumps me
new and able and tells me
to stock the shelves, weed the boxes.