for Chen Chen
A fathom used to mean the furthest distance a person could reach.
A yawn—like chasm, chaos, or hiatus—is another name for space.
Chiasma: inside the globe of the brain, there is a dark place where
two hemispheres meet. The French say that dusk falls in-between
two kinds of beasts. Horny bodies. Bodies that cannot make their
own heat. The arc of a flung fist. The way a dog circles before it
sits down. Eyes lined with blue crescents because the phone rings
and rings. An open mouth. Commas, especially when they separate
two or more items in a list: a boy, a beacon, a buoy. It’s like I’ve
been running, all night, beside myself.