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Nashville Drip Season

He removed himself with his hands, an effort not unnoticed.
People threw shells, congotronic drumming looped
from the roof. At the same time, days of orphan motels, smoking

for a living, public swards for romance, disgruntlement—
the things that really pink a day’s edges—withered,
leaving only hay at weddings to reign as a mood coming

down the pipe—sure, sort of obvious—but the molting begun
in our minds, we thanked our teachers for language to explain it
anyway. Currently, people speak with surety about how

everything’s stacking skyward, symptomatically Ethiopian
in its ageless cultural emphasis though not bothered by the same civilized
perfection and the next thing one knows, one may as well have gone

back to church. There are a few tells: lights and confections, a woman
with a box, in case I suppose the dawn unexpectedly breaks all over
someone’s face, this sort of thing. One moment you are thinking

with the brightest hours then someone—you? your neighbor?—
is suddenly sobbing an unexpected component into the unrelenting mix,
e.g. a specific vitality wind-milling six sinewy arms, signaling a herd of goats

could be sealed in there and having nothing to do with you, when white paper
softer than cloth appears in your hand, as all at once
the limousine doors swing open and the shooting begins.