First: the piano. Then, the imagination.
Imagine a five-minute drive to the water.

Then, a violin, a slice of gala, the chill
behind the vents. Not mine, but someone’s

someone behind the window. Then,
imagine mine. It is all about simultaneity,

all about simulacrum, the man clearing the table
after dinner is not always engorged

as a flooded stream. He is often weightless,
arid as a traffic light blinking yellow. We have

entered our old shoulders at last. The sweat
on his collar bone forms a triangle

on his shirt. Focus on the angles. We are
not yet our mothers and fathers, but shapes,

lines, geometric. Think not of parenthood,
think not of death, of failure. Think

only smaller, small ideas. A five-minute
walk to the store, a segment of an orange,

French word for water. Eau, you say, eau.