I am alone
with these feeble lettuce leaves
falling off my fork
missing my mouth --
I'm sowing our hardwood floors

trying my best to keep myself
inside the frame
practicing cushioned words
like home
forcing the cat upon my lap

sensitive, cloud-like creature
it takes a sudden leap
every time my father's ghost
floats across the room
changing corners or pretending
to go for a leak

with the cat chasing after him
as if he were a fly, a moth at night
whose only elusion
is the sure death
along a remorseless window pane

and daddy, when you come back
would you bring me that gray sweater

and the remote control, too
to touch, to skip every channel
of sadness
every actor looks like daddy
every actor speaks of you
even if he's just praising margarine

interrupted by the shrill summer
on channel 8,
a harmless movie, a harmless touch
between some girl
and Freddie Prinze Jr. --

always liked him
that hesitating mouth
the tragic eyes of the tongue-tied clown
always thought he should make real movies
with that face --

that's what I'm thinking now, too
wrapped in my boyfriend's gray sweater
soaking up

the scent of my love.