A goat heart has appeared
in the basket of apples.
The answer is yes
to your next question
& the sound is enormous,
the size of a stadium.
The walls of my little house
shake with goat operas
& I do not even mind
that the apples are ruined
& the banks have foreclosed
on my unhappiness & time
is a goat heart we spend
our whole lives chewing
to the other side of. Beyond
this wall of pulsing redness
there is a grove of cedar trees
that look like women falling
into the earth, green gowns
flying up over their heads.
Apples grow from the cedar
trees, but goat hearts instead
of apples. An old man eats
from a basket of goat hearts
& is shocked to find one apple
& to answer your question,
no, & the stillness is overwhelming.
This man is called
father, or so my blood tells
me. Have I spoken yet of him
to you? Instead I will tell you
of a goat heart in a basket
of apples, please. Instead
of saying his name, I will
bite into a living machine
with a prayer inside it & he
who has my shoulders & sits
in a cedar grove will bite
into a perfect stillness & elsewhere
a goat will fall & a field
of worms will catch on fire
& you will reach into a basket
of nothing & pull out a fucking star.