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27 Shadow Patch of night, shade from some big doll’s eclipse, spy cooked up on cocaine and running guns to the other side. Contract. In this universal: the particular, a little smack of death, big leaves, that shade-loving plant. Here’s memory, clothed. Here the fur shaved off to club the poodle’s legs, and in the pile of newsprint dripping off the paper tossed through rain against the steps I’ve fallen to but do not lie against, all the news of fire spreading, trees that rise up, phoenix, from their dark lakes, their shadows out in public, Elvis imitators, all bad satin and his wrap-arounds. When we began to pull the blinds down? When we began to squint? Naked cousin to mirage, nuance, color’s ghost, I sign to you because we stocked the shelves together, once, used the sticky gun when prices were reduced, because in school you’d complain so constantly, in silence, how copies ruled the halls. To you because you’ve moved along inside my gloom or joy, as someone constant. Since at night you deepen, bulk into the size of space. Because you are imperfect. Since you follow me. Because, on too-bright mornings, I’m willing now to see the one I can’t become. ...

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