today this is not my life

& i am a video game waterfall full of pixels.
i open the windows wide as a shark's mouth 
until they grow teeth. knives live
behind my eyelids in a little town
that's very sharp. god is a hole
in time. he is getting wider.
i have a dream where my underwear 
is slippery & falls off in a pool.
my phone floats on the surface
as a dead rat. meanwhile, the subway rats
are playing truth or dare. they are
braiding the tail of a comet. 
i will miss everything tomorrow morning
when the mirage is over. the faucet 
spills fruit punch. i punch a straw 
through the shell of an egg & breathe.
how knows where your fingers go 
while you sleep. caterpillars on tree branches.
my father wants me to be 
a zoo keeper. he buys lions for me
& mails them in giant cardboard boxes.
they are always dead by the time they arrive
& i am forced to dispose of the bodies piecemeal 
the way you might how to break a part a piano
to fit it into black plastic bags.
sometimes i hope one lion will be alive
& he will eat me & then walk miles & miles
to the ocean, jump into the ocean 
& that somehow i will become 
a small island where tall grass grows 
& no one thinks
to land their ships. it is always better
to do things alone 
by which i mean
if you do it alone no one can see
you make mistakes 
& no one will ask you
why you left so much behind. my father
is often at my door. he is a school
of pirannah or a aluminum baseball bat.
how do you learn to live 
in one body? i miss the fog taking care
of us all. i miss my fingers 
when they're away.