visitation by goats

the first goat arrives
through a crack in the window. it is important
to shut all corners of a safe house
if you intend to hide away 
for any extended amount of time. i was careless.
either that or i wanted to be 
infiltrated. my dating app is empty
& the gutter is full of yellow leaves.
who knows all his/her own brilliant corners?
not me. i could not tell you 
how many fingers i had this morning 
let alone the number of doors
cracked to let in a breeze. a breeze
is always swelling into 
a breach. the goat starts buy eating 
the slash between his/her which is
a wonderful relief. the truth is
i have always wanted an animal
with a bolder sense of hunger than me.
humans are mostly just cowardly
& sometimes very very bold. we are best
at envisioning our own endings. sometimes
when i'm driving i see my car
plummetting off the side of the cliff.
more goats come. all the hooves
patter like hard constant rain.
the fissures in the walls 
are meant to be stepped through.
i consider where else i might make
a hole. one goat walks on the ceiling.
the pupils of his eyes are a portal
down into a new kind of basement full
of even more teeth. 
in my room i open my mouth 
& try to eat a door knob. the goat
tells me i have to close my eyes
& pretend there is nothing else left
in the whole world to be eaten.
all the goat eyes burn through my eye lids
until i am left with goat eyes too.
they are hatches i can lift 
& slip into. dark little quiet rooms.
damp & stone. all these little 
tunnels. on the floor of the rooms
are all kinds of teeth fossils.
a shark tooth & even the teeth 
of an iguanodon & then the small teeth
of god: square & yellowish 
even by the dim light 
of my tongue. the goats are waiting
for me to return to my face.
the are circling me for one reason
or another. i want to never
be alone. i seal the cracks in the house
to keep the goats inside.
all of us. a little herd.
my lesson for you is that
a goat cannot be contained
by a wall alone. i woke up
with an empty house. in the mirror
i found my circle pupils again.
i state in the closet & shut the door.
to contemplate what i knew now
about hooves. outside it rained
for seven days straight.