Universe
I’ve stared at my dog’s
asshole for years. A cosmos
contracting—
or expanding? The dilation
of time. She exposes
pink and gray tissue
of life—which is also, of course,
death. Maybe when
I’m
blank, we will exist in the
universe of a dog’s bold
pucker. I wouldn’t mind. I don’t
think shit is the opposite
of verve. Not when it’s warm
beneath my
hand, closer to my senses
than the moon (why so
many odes to that
cold, distant effacement?). The snow
makes an untouched field of wax,
moved by her euphoric jounce. It seems
as if thousands of geese
open overhead as my dog
bows down to drop
her radiant work.
After the 2nd IVF Consult, I Wonder
why does the body
when running
long to walk?
The easiest desire
to satisfy
is the one
that comes in
the moment of
giving up. I no longer want
to try: the needles
button like a clock. Tick
tock, the
on. The ovaries age. I place
(shove) one more pessary
to an unknowable, dark place. I try
to warm my fingers with my
own flesh—but my body is
faulty in this, too. The ice
doesn’t melt. My cold digits
manipulate the cordless
mouse, navigate the cursor
to linger over a small
box. I can’t tell what
wants me to say
“Yes,” but I agree to
whatever is next—more
blood accumulated, money
too. How would it
feel to just knock
off? To be
the bird that lifts
free while its circle
continues to feed?
A tree’s dried leaves—
almost as if stenciled on,
a children’s picture of what a tree should be
when dying
when in winter
the tree not yet ready to surrender
the architecture of its work—
looked heavy as gold
in the bath of streetlight. I had turned
back early from the walk—my dog’s limp
turned up. The veterinarian had
said “$250” on the phone, to prepare
me for Monday’s extra cost. My dog held
her leg up, there in the night, her
fur the color of expensive teeth. What is
valued? I thought, the air taut and precious
around me, this being the tip
of the year following our hottest. The leaves
like something molten, they rattled
with import, and I wanted them to release.
They had clung on so long. The tax
documents were starting to arrive. The CDs
advertised at good rates. I couldn’t
do the calculations, my dog’s exquisite leg
lifted like a crooked branch. What is money
in its divine form, if not a
body, full of the clearest love?
Nora Hickey lives in Springfield, Ohio, where she is a librarian at Ridgewood School. She writes about comics at Autobiographix on Substack. Her work also appears in Guernica, Electric Lit, Hyperallergic, and elsewhere.
instagram: @norashickey | substack: @autobiographix