once i had a rainbow machine 

two prisms. a window. the sun
all watermelon in its september.
college students with fingers 
like coat hangers. all the door knobs 
in the world turning at once.
our dorm room was microwave humid.
a bracelet of ants made its way
across the wall. i lied to the lamp lights
& told them i needed to astral project 
somewhere else each morning.
really, i ran on a treadmill. 
sometimes a rainbow would join me
with all its shivering but 
it would never stay long. rainbows always have
somewhere else to go. i imagine
a whole world exists dedicated to each color.
i like to think my violet self 
is wiser & that apples taste vaguely
like bruises there. the rainbow machine
visits all these fragments 
& returns with only their light.
i put my bed in a tree. i put a tree
in the basement. a refrigerator
blooms from the carpet. a rose
opens on the windowsill & is consumed 
by the ants. we sit on the floor.
my roommate visits the violet world 
when she sleeps. i sleep walk once 
& end up in the bathroom 
on the floor below us. our building 
grows long hairy legs & attempts 
to walk away. we read books 
at our desks. she is gone
& i lay on the floor by myself
with only the company 
of the rainbow machine. the machine
tells me a story of when it was first
harvesting wave lengths. i tell the machine
i want to be in love all the time
but by "love" i don't mean "love"
i mean rapid acceleration. i'm willing
to open my window & crawl out on the roof
for the next boy. i'm willing
to slip into the red world
& steal a slice of the color for him.
my body need a fun house mirror
to look assembled. the rainbow machine
moves faster & faster. whirling color.
i tell it i need more time. the days move
across my roommate's face & she doesn't seem
bothered by it. she goes through her routine
& i go through mine
all the while the rainbow machine
is culling us for color. i lose 
all my yellow one saturday & the next week
there is no green to be found. 
i search out the colors 
in the surrouning town. walks on the trail.
sitting in a target parking lot.
the rainbow machine eventually dies.
it falls from the window 
where it perched. i do not try
to fix it. i feel relief & fear.
will it haunt me? yes it will. 
my roommate sleeps heavy. 
she doesn't notice it's gone.
the air conditioner does little 
to strip the orange from the room.
we wake up in summer & the room
folds back down into 
a slice of printer paper.