Flaring in epithelial darkness, as if bitten
by a rabid, magnetic gesture—
all at once—body, converted to hydrogen
all at once—hydrogen under pressure.

Magnetic pressures, within and without,
the bear hibernates in a lush’s cranium.
When the room starts to spin, the bear rushes out
and deposits itself for a glass of uranium.

Who led me across the city that morning?
Behind the railway station, he sat me down at a low
wooden table and produced a bottle. We cracked it like a watermelon.
My Adam's apple bobbing, as though I and the rails had shared the swallow.

On the fence was a pumpkin. I used to think the elixir of debility
was in the potato. But no! It's in the pumpkin,
an octave below. From the instability
of its inner glow, fingers of pulp emerge as if counting.

In a factory where they make chloramphenicol
          cats          loiter

one—gnarled
          like a woodblock: waterlogged, barnacled
another—thin with an elongated tongue—
          a fireman’s hook
and the third—huge like a calm
          in the Persian Gulf

Navigating on roller-skates in the dark, I understand:
the country around me vibrates.
The spider’s mute web
reflects an equilateral slumber. Both Satan
and a cobra next to him would seem pusillanimous, two schlimazels.
On the other side of the glass, the spider is quieter
          than my phone in Basel.