Veil
The doll told me
to exist.
It said, “Hypnotize yourself.”
It said time would be
transfixed.
*
Now the optimist
sees an oak
shiver
and a girl whiz by
on a bicycle
with a sense of pleasurable
suspense.
She budgets herself
with leafy
prestidigitation.
I too
am a segmentalist.
*
But I’ve dropped
more than an armful
of groceries or books
downstairs
into a train station.
An acquaintance says
she colors her hair
so people will help her
when this happens.
To refute her argument,
I must wake up
and remember my hair’s
already dyed.
*
As a mentalist,
I must suffer
lapses
then repeat myself
in a blind trial.
I must write
punchlines only I
can hear
and only after
I’ve passed on
