MARINA GIPPS (Chicago, Illinois)

A lantern on a window ledge, lonely,
before expiring itself to the notion of sleep
when supermarkets stay open long after-
for the malingering of confused shopppers.

What a price to pay for the slaughter
of cloven-hoofed animals, the corpus of gods.
In Milwaukee, a woman lies naked for another woman
about to make coffee in her dull percolator.
Awakening to the smell of cream

Colored bricks of a city, whose same political radio
disorients ghosts throughout the day-
busses humming for more taxidermied passengers.
She's anticipating another cigarette.