Nude Descending an Empire

Song: Infernal

8 Song: Infernal I was lost in the middle of my life when the planes hit the towers, lost in the middle of my life when the glass gods, one at a time, cowered and fell, when a bomb of blue sky exploded a bride where she stood— I was lost in the middle of my life, far from a leopard, far from a dark wood— when the night clerk at Circle K handed me back too much change, I was lost in the middle of our life’s way, when an army of wings arranged on flatbed trucks brushed past me on the road, I was lost in the hallways of a glass dream, trying to find my way out to the ground turning in circles, crying secretly in green languages, unknown even to me— far from a lion, far from a dark wood— with armfuls of Fritos, and ribs, and iced tea, and web pages circling through my blood. There were wires all around, and siren wails and people running about, bereft and intent as I. I didn’t know whether to stay still and wait for my life to grow transparent 9 there in my chair, with the sprinklers overhead like golden showers of sorrow and emergency lights flashing red up and down the hall or whether to run madly from stairwell to stairwell, kissing women’s knees and the foreheads of men, drunk on cries for help beseeching and singing and weeping entering one life after another and leaping from each one. Yes, I was lost in the middle of the tower when I came upon my life. ...