PNEUMONIA

Lungs a tenement, swollen, easy to move into.

Hair-clogged, bathtub a standing pool.

The ground floor is sublet by a fevered tenant

who wallpapers with wet newspaper and wheatpaste.


Water slips through a valve’s loosened fist. Drip.


A building of wood rot and mice, back alleys

cluttered with bone, shit, small bodies.

Lungs: welfare’s small-change jar.

Plastic, whispery, just for now.