for Bob Miner

 

Now I understand what it feels like

in the deep antiseptic cold of the strange,

 

the Rainbow’s End populated primarily

with grey and beige and brown, but you

 

really must appreciate the effort, rigorous

care taken in arranging my shrunken family

 

in a Christmas card post-mortem photograph,

death masks on and grinning, but you see,

 

sometimes there are things that must be done,

I pull my white matter through my nose with

 

a steel crowbar to clear my thoughts, soar

into the constellations of stellate exit wounds,

 

perhaps returning to Earth too soon, but always

leaving a small part of myself in the refrigerator.