works by william pham, 2005-present

index | poetry | fiction

Without Lemon or Consequence

A dog in a purse.

Three men meet in a bar:
Marcel, Magritte, Man Ray;
Forty years too soon for
A dog in a purse.

What do I know?
I know a little
nothing.  I know
belonging and
not belonging
to that little cafe
on State Street.
  Two hours or more to receive an entrée, during which
  I consumed nine pieces of bread and drank two glasses
  of ice water without lemon or consequence.

A dog in a purse.
A girl in a bed.

Her ghost slips around my neck and tongue,
slides across my collarbone and traces
a snail's path down each vertebrae,
like the journey of Robert Falcon Scott
and like Robert Falcon Scott and his four
this will not end with any fanfare.

I will make a home out of a place
without lemon or consequence.

copyright (c) 2007 by william pham