IX
                                                                                                 and
                              he holds the shakers as if he were squeezing the red
                              and black wires attached to the car’s battery
                              and if there were something wooden, he’d put it between
                              his teeth and then he could scream to himself, then let them
                              cut his leg off, let them cut a tit off,
                              let them bend, as they do, above his mouth
                              and share their literary lives with him
                              or, worse yet, tell him jokes, “have you heard the one
                              about Auschwitz, there was a barbed wire fence
                              and there was a German colonel with an eye patch
                              and riding crop,” the while they’re pouring hot gold
                              into his empty teeth, the while he answers
                              with his mouth open and on his back, making a
                              sound like a seal in distress or a walrus hungry
                              for halibut and flapping his fins and singing,
                              for he was a walrus most of all and at the
                              cash register he made a walrus sound
                              which sounded most of all like someone coming,
                              maybe coming unexpectantly the way
                              it grabs you, nor can you say “oops,” nor can you
                              apologize, oh never that, oh never,
                              never apologize, not for that, apologize
                              for lies, apologize to the Filipinos,
                              apologize to the Africans, to the Jews,
                              to the Cherokee, the Japanese, the Mexicans—
                              “We’re sorry, we thought you were dogs.”