The Brooklyn Rail

All the roads
rush to one

place within

my face it’s
the complexity

mountains and

other differentiated
celebrated scenic

icons equate when

they look back
and wait for

the birth of

something human
my face is not

a mountain

mission nor is
it a massively

apparent mole

hill my face
is not a missile

which will miss

any point it’s
trying to make

it’s not a wedge

of wood thick
as paper or a

pound of pavement

smooth as glass
it’s not the

ocean rippled

with realizations
nor is it the

essence of any

OK situation all
roads rushing it’s

what you see but

will not say
my face is the

remnant of a

disintegrated soul
a skin-covered

puzzle-hinged

mandible that once
belonged to an animal frame in

ungraved burial