How to Maintain Eye Contact
after Robert Wood Lynn
Gave up lying to children, lying
to adults pays more. There’s more
to lose in what’s gone. The secret
is keeping those in which the past
coalesces indebted to something.
Don’t look at photos or journals.
Instead, gift your first love a flight
of your new fluids & ask them
if you’ve changed (have you?).
The number one cause of memory
loss is memory. Gave up lying
to anyone who isn’t me. The secret
is ignoring the camera & staring
at your mirrored self, so everything
you do is done to you in reverse.
Don’t pine for youth’s homesteads.
Instead write a poem about a poem
about protecting the explosions
of innocence that move, unsteady
as a slicked lamb, across the earth.
The number one cause of change
is nothing (really, have you?) is lying
in the surplus placenta & soaking
back into the pasture & it’s all
fine & there’s still time. Shit,
I’m doing it again. I confess
there’s a future here for people
who want it. Hey, have this one—
not as bright as it was, it grows
smaller if you stare or look away.
