The Hope Chest

When I close my eyes there’s a white key.

But maybe it’s a box, so I can’t press it.

The sides are shell blue, but I can’t check

without turning the box. The musician

told me his sister and he would say Morgem

and expose the teeth and flare the nostrils

to express a particular affection. The white box

won’t say Morgem. Or Corbemsalad.

It must be a heartbreaking desk.

It says to be in on a secret

just means to know you’re in a secret — 

the pleasure’s like two people

beheld by a third in the act

of making meaning.

It says on one hospital floor

the humans die.

Another they give birth.

A third they grow new chins.

At a fourth they’re lopped.

When the floors mix by mistake,

it’s usually in the middle

where the desk rasps

under husks of  ink, and the nostrils

grow for air. We talk, never sing,

because music gives the god room to stretch

and the god kills by growing in the head.