Benjamin Carson

Clavis

(For Ted Richer)

This could be the key to unlock the case, she said.

. . .

What case? I asked. What key?

. . .

She said, this could be the key to unlock the case.

. . .

What key? I asked. What case?

. . .

This is the key that unlocks the case, she said.

. . .

This, she said, is the key that unlocks the case.

. . .

What case? I asked. What key?

. . .

This key. This case. You. Me. This.

Calligraphy

Your moon here—

Limps on down

***

Dislocation

***

Implication—

Ripen slowly.

Somewhere Now

Somewhere, maybe near you, a man is drinking himself to death, and somewhere a man is shitting in a hole. Somewhere a woman is hailing a cab and another is ordering a Merlot. Somewhere a man is duct taping his girlfriend’s hands and tickling her nipples with a feather, and just north of Schenectady, in a place called Scotia, a man is burying a cat. His sister is looking for her keys. At this moment, somewhere, a woman is waiting and wanting to die, and somewhere a child is foaming at the mouth in the backseat of a hot car, her mother shopping for shoes. In India a man waits for a train and a woman bathes in the Ganges. A man eats sushi in Japan, another eats sushi in Miami, and somewhere a girl named Porsche is braiding her hair. Someone somewhere is chewing gum, and somewhere a teenager is driving his car into the side of a car driven by a woman. Someone somewhere is wondering about the woman he killed. Somewhere a trucker looks to pick up a hitchhiker, and somewhere a hitchhiker waits for a ride. A boy is meeting now with a girl whom, in a year, he will ask to be his wife. They are young but so is the boy who is eating out of the garbage in Tuscaloosa. A woman, six months pregnant, falls down the stairs and is bleeding into her underwear. A woman caught in traffic curses her luck. Somewhere in Cambodia a man vomits in an alley, and someone somewhere is being diagnosed with cancer and someone is being robbed and someone is putting a cotton swab in his ear and someone is playing the violin. Right now, a guy is filling his car with gas and wondering how far he’ll make it before he’s far enough away to forget her. A farmer is praying for rain. A boy is wondering if it’s wrong to be aroused by his cousin who is a boy who, like him, loves Jesus. A grandmother is winning at rummy and a granddaughter is riding her bike into the street. A mailman is running over a child who rode her bike into the street. This is happening. It’s happening now. A boy touching himself for the first time, a girl taking a sip of her father’s beer, a father dropping a hammer on his toe, a brother choking on a chicken bone. A dog is getting lost and a pig is getting its throat cut. A child who fell off of a moving train is being run over, the toes of his bodiless leg are twitching and ants smell the blood. Someone inhales smoke from the fire that will kill her, and someone smashes a tv set at a motel in Laramie. Girls are on their phones and boys are on their phones. College students are drinking coffee and questioning everything. Someone somewhere is confessing. A woman is writing a novel and wondering where the story’s going. A grandfather is wondering where the time went. Somewhere a man is whipping a box with a belt and someone is making a sign for a protest. Right now, people are against things. A man in Budapest is leaning against a lamp post and humming “Himnusz.” Somewhere an athlete is kneeling. A bird is dying. A squirrel is building a nest. A rat is eating a body in an elevator shaft in Detroit. A boat is sinking. An uncle is drowning. A sister is cursing. A man named Daryl is in prison and passing a kite. Somewhere a woman is saying “enough.” A man is ordering pie and another is turning off a radio. A police officer is being arrested for being drunk and disorderly in a bar on the edge of Milwaukee. A man with a limp is limping. Somewhere a man with a limp is grateful. A woman is faking an orgasm. A boy is smelling his finger. Someone is writing a poem. Somewhere a man sharpens a blade, another polishes a boot. A man gets pulled through the streets by a rope, a mother crosses a border, a child dies in a desert. Someone smoking is watching someone dying and is laughing. A boy plays the harmonica, another catches a fish. A couple kisses in Central Park and two men enjoy hamburgers in Redwater. There is an alligator digesting a dog, a man loading a gun. A woman is praying in Rome, a man is praying in Paris, parishioners are praying in Mt. Willing. Somewhere right now, maybe near you, a child is being born.