overgrown

the mirror is full of weeds
they lattice my double-face
like a wall. i don't have enough 
poison to free my flipside.
once we lived in a twin house
& the duplicate sofa slumped
into the fresh dirt. swam with raccoons 
& red wandering. the old men 
versions of ourselves used the oven
to store newspapers. they walked 
the halls holding hands for fear
of getting lost. your shadow self
is feeling left out. you should 
be more open to collaboration
with windows. i open mine
& see a necklace of reflections.
house after house. there was a model
god used to make us. filled each 
with spit & dust. i'm one cough away
from just being a cloud. even the clouds
have binaries. the twin house died 
& the old men selves laid 
face up in the grass. moss grew
over their bodies until they turned
to stone. the stones dispersed 
over the length of my life
& i find them all the time:
a knuckle, a wrist, a chin. 
our real house flourish in the wake.
we cut down the tree in the yard
but its shadow remained painted
in the grass. you can't 
deconstruct the twofold of every body.
sometimes i take my girlhood for
a walk. she is a goose & wants
to migrate with the rest of them
but i need her right where i can see her. 
we're all in the process of swallowing
the other side. all universes 
are just looking for the right one.
which version is going to be
the pleasure one? the mirror 
is so dense there's no such thing 
as checking my face. i touch
my forehead & see the leaves rustle.
there has to be a knife that could fix this
but then again isn't great 
to be the only one in a series?
i take to trusting the blurry form
seen in sidewalk ice. i could be
invisible. i could be a whole house.
i might even be the old stone man--
moss on my teeth. moss on my arms.
check my hands for signs 
of dilapidation. not yet. just
fogged flesh & a backyard ripe
with budding pairs of wrists.
take the doorknob from under 
my pillow & pocket it just in case.