I’m not the one you think,

the one who lisps th to his name,

who melodramatically draped in black

scythes each umbilical for the last time.

I’m with you yet

even as you are with each other,

the corpse you drag around

charred by an inner fire

silent because its mouth is glued,

someone you loved now an absence

a white hole perforated at the edges.

Electricity from some despicable source

(fossil fuels or nuclear voodoo)

travels down a wire in a way

you’ll never understand, lighting up

each bulb lashed together

blinking on America’s December lawn.

Around each of them the opposite of shadow

tries to create a sunny world

where you’re too cold to live.

I live too despite this moribund label.

What’s your excuse for not being glad?

Let your mind be a star to follow.