Start the day:

shoveling fog into your mouth for breakfast.

​

The mist of the morning curls in your stomach

and drifts between your lips, a swallow away

 

from hardening, a pellet upon the altar.

Recall: it begins in the pit below your ribs,

​

that sensitive spot where the blades slice

cleanly, quick, neat: a cavity gaping for circumstance.

​

I remember now. How the ache pings after,

an echo that can almost be heard as it settles

​

like haze in the sunlight. Even the fog has its dawn.

I hear it: the beginning. The haunt of day recedes,

​

and I yearn for the kind of pain that has no origin.

You discover it: here. Turn it over. Eat that, too.