ash tray

have you seen my crystal organ?
i need a place to desintegrate gracefully.
rubbing the white ash between
my two fingers. i taste dead fish 
on the air. the wind is holding
a knife. the neighbors pull thier blinds shut.
do not ask for help but if you do 
make sure you know where all 
your jewels are. bargaining again
with a passing angel, i say,
"have you heard the one 
about the lost daughter?"
we enter the room of smoke.
cats flicking butts from their cigarettes.
my grandmother is often an outline
in a doorway. her old apartment complex
with the duck fountain that never worked.
instead, it gathered rain water
in its belly. crystal ash tray 
on her little porch. she would often
lose a finger. i saw it turn to dust. 
i know this is what is becoming of me.
o vessel. gather me up. make me 
into a morsel of carrying. i do not want
to be scattered yet. instead, i want to lurk
like the scent of tobacco years later
still sewn into her clothe gloves.
a haunting the size of a tongue.
birds sitting in their ash trays 
in the trees. an ash tray 
between my ribs. bear trap. bird cage.
all of it, waiting for the knife 
to cut them loose.