1.

Can you confirm            

                    who you are

                  & where you’re headed?

    Will you submit

                        to a battery

       of tests & questions?

                          For example, how many drinks

                      have you consumed

   since the last time your past

                              walked like a cop

         through a hospital of dream?

Were they enough    

                     to make you feel again?


       2.

Look at me.

       When I hold this finger     in front of you, follow

     its motion

                  with only your mind.

    Is this the same

                     sway & rock      that brought you here?

      When you stare

                       at this stimulus—      unthinking digit—

 do the blue & white lights

                                     flashing against trees & snow

        bring you back to that night?


       3.                 

Can you even see

               beyond yourself

                       the tragedy of my own life—

   the way I’ve been bullied

                 into this work—

       my childhood a carnival                  of fears:

                              the dark/

                   strangers/           cold nights/

         conspiracies

               that find me in the woods  

                               under the smiling moon?


       4.

Walk nine steps   heeltotoe

                            hands by your side.

        I will say when.

                                   When we begin

     is there anything that could keep you

                                from completing this test

                                from walking off this icy road

                         completely, from breathing

       a cloud of cold

                    then stepping forward

   and ducking into it

                          to wear it like a hat?


       5.

If I could love myself                     I would chop wood

                    for days     whittle

 deadfall traps & arrows                   for a quiver.

                      I would live

       more naturally—            leave

                         laws

     to physics & philosophers

                          —and below the clouds

  chew the grass of my littleness.


       6.

                Are there any prescriptions

you take

                            to make the world a safer place?

    Have you swallowed anything

                                     whose effects

       you wear like a foreigner’s clothes?


       7.

Recite for me the alphabet

                          backwards starting with Zed—Zack

      each letter representing

                              one of your dead.

Be sure to include those

                             you loved less.

           When you hear

                                 the echo of their names

     skate across the frozen pond

                                    can you feel

                a shiver in your limbs?


       8.

Lift one leg just high enough

                        for a muskrat wearing boots

       to pass through.


       9.

            Will you tell me

   under what influences

                    you’ve been?    Are there tabs or pills

        or lines you’ve ingested

                              that still rattle

           your chest?               


       10.

Close your eyes and extend             your hand. 

                       Can you sign

                                       your name in cursive

           just above the Great Rift dust?

                                    The tip of your finger dipping

     in the dark ink of space?

                          The motion circling forward

    like an ocean of confession

                        crashing on shore?


       11.

Open your eyes. Blow into this gun

                                 every thought & memory

      until I’ve said stop.

                          What percentage

              of guilt                        might it measure?

   Can you see        there are no good guys

                                    here?


       12.

Count for me

                    the fingers I’m holding up

      behind my back.

                      The thumb is not a finger

        unless I say it is.

                      Now put your hands

    behind your back

                       & imagine yourself in summer

   having rowed yourself

                        from the rounded stones of a quiet lake

           to floating        

                            eyes closed

       soaking in a warmth

                         under the glowing star      

               of knowing

                                      you could take this life

                      or leave it   

                                   & all you own—

the boat stolen—

      is this moment      this quiet like heat

         this loll              

                          this gentle lull

lakewater slapping the hull

                            a lost mother shushing the loss—

    if you can hear it

                         over these tires slipping

      in the fresh-fallen, over 

                          these wipers & radio,

  a phalanx of timber & limbs

                            whirring in the desolate night

       please state for the record

                             the meaning of this     all of this.