vortex

during our semi-annual
armageddon, i bought a machine
to suck the house flies from the air.
a tiny vortex that sang 
old show tunes (which i hate).
it did not catch as many flies
as i would have hoped it could.
instead, i woke up many mornings
tangled in the light. myself, a sort
of housefly with my eyes 
like shiny snow globes & the windows 
bleating for the moon. i am prone 
to traps. once, as a girl, i tried to free
a mouse from a glue trap & ended up
getting stuck too. i made it out
alive & they did not. the vortex lives
beneath the house sometimes 
& other days it lives in my ribs &
other days, when i am particularly anxious,
it lives right behind my teeth. 
i find myself the fly catch. the piles
of shiny celophane wings. the hunger
for just a needle-prick's worth
of blood. dear god the vortex is 
beautiful when you let it get big.
i imagined myself opening
all the windows & letting the plague in.
the end times like a flock of 
horrors. i never did. i hung on. 
we brushed the vortex until 
it could fit again into the palm of
my hand. the tax man has a ray gun
& he is standing at the end 
of the driveway. i do not want to be
so close to so many vortexes & yet
i also want to be inside them. 
deep in the wild guts. a turning 
not so much like a drain but more
like a microwave show. call me a hot pocket
or a house fly. i have a heart
the size of a clicked tongue
& i am terrified.