That familiar hum inside and out.
The thrumming TV static-snow blustering my brain
like when I slid down a steep mountain backward on my ass,
the board strapped to my boots kicking up torrents of snow
coating my eyes and nose as I plummeted blindly
facing only where I came from.
That happened then for this very day–teleported.
Today’s that cold-faced day.
The snap-to-it chill smacks mightily,
your face-skin taut with expectation,
braced to ward off the front,
the sting of knowing you could trip,
lose your step and your knees buckle,
your bones splinter and your ankle crack.
Something tragically foretold unbeknownst to you,
the usual chaos lurking out there along your life’s line.
To feel that approaching crisis is to live.
But only on days like these,
wedged between enough and not enough
and itch and scratched.
Our clothes are fresh but our visions stale, our breath coffee rotten.
These days smell like winter kill.
But it’s only the dying fall when crockpot lamb-stew and mulch
pepper muddy moods built for cutting,
crying into dust and hanging amulets.
Her neck exposes naked-ruddy latticed vines,
burnt and creased in spider legs enfolded,
smothered and feathered like aortic-bony leaves,
en-sleeving jugular flush–
as if the world pumped incessantly
in syncopated gurgles,
muffled to the dull roaring hum.
In the gaze of the other 