Neurosity: The Desire to Define

neurosity is the renter’s queer disorientation
when she becomes the room; the coconut
filaments of hollow snakes — folding and unfolding

onto themselves — the fumbling arrogance,
so elegant and unrefined, the iron and wine
of confusing adrenaline for fear — the missing
apothecary table full of serengeti tea — neurosity

is the biconvex marrow of burnt sienna.
neurosity is not sleep, but the estranged mother
of death, not deep in the nook of each crescendo,

not the peripheral demand for flesh or pancakes,
but the difficulty of manipulating domestic objects —
the thread spool or the ladle or the can of oranges

and sardines, scalloping them into the sharp
pin-wheel-kaleidoscope, a bobbin full of yolk.
neurosity is the sweltering state of hospitality,

the epochs of counting backwards, an entire
civilization made of ants, rats, and roaches,
the chiffon goiters of thought, it is the Vietnamese

immigrant tailor isolated on stage — blinded
by the empty audience — bathing in their restless
laughter and currents of lissome pencil shavings.