The Empire of Absinthe
       

All the buildings were smoke-bearded and swayed
wasted on nitrous. Quiet. Though you could hear through

the balls of your feet the muffled intonations of a toy piano
navigating the sewers below. I had a paper cut for a voice.
I was mostly alone. But the aura was a crowd in which I

was to be beaten with the belt of my tongue.
Sky was a pelt stretched steeple to needle-nose steeple.

Just to breathe was to inhale through couch cushions soaked
in gasoline. Half floating, half sitting, a woman bled her

nose into a white rag while her little god routed through
the museum's bushes for the legs of crickets to twist.

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Copyright © 2014 Bill Rasmovicz All rights reserved
from Idiopaths
Brooklyn Arts Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission