The Hurt Opera

The opera kneels all night

in her desperate colors

on the kitchen floor.

Bruised, ancient opera.

Her inky sap drips down

spring’s fresh glass.

Like an insect, she can’t

be trained. The dentist says

her fillings, made of tiny crushed

flies, must be replaced: She says

that’s how she likes them.

Dingy, mean opera.

When she makes me dinner,

there is no love between us,

only eels,

still alive in their butter

& anger. On walks,

the opera pulls cold turnips

straight from the ground,

watches my face as she bites,

as if to say, Yes,

I came from your raw

dark pocket, but I shall live

without you as a monk

lives without water. Scary

opera. Stingy, lean opera.

I am just a simple man.

I hold her head when it leaks,

& call out when she shrinks

smaller than her name

in encyclopedia.