Utility pole

You are always useful,

even when bloated with

the dread

and emptiness

that makes you crawl outside,

find a utility pole,

clawing up and up

with fingernails uncut

and hair adrift

like the logs you saw

swimming in the ocean

when you were six,

sawed redwoods with no life jackets

and no branches and leaves,

just like this pole

where you hang yourself –

then when all settles with

different logs tumbling

in a different current,

you are stack of legal pulp,

a paycheck for an electrician,

and a ledge for the birds.

Your mouth is a nest.

Listen how you coo.