All of this,
gone in 30 days.
Both futons, the tables,
all the furniture,
gone in 30 days.
Bespectacled,
walking around
looking at books perched
in the tall bookcases,
water freezing
in the shape of ice cubes
in the refrigerator,
the water knows
le mot juste,
the refrigerator stays,
the carpet will be torn up
and replaced, the carpet stains
will be replaced by new stains
and eventually the fridge
will sputter and melt
and be gone, begone!
I will be gone.
I will leave and be gone,
the tall bookcases
with all the books
will be gone. Sail.

Within 30 days
I will give away the swivel chair
where I have slept in fitful dreams
when my frame was stricken low
everyday with inexplicable fatigue,
when in those exhaustive dreams
I grew old, this is where I grew old
and this was not a fitful dream.

The bathroom mirror
will be wiped clean and clear.
I will use Windex and paper towels
to wipe clean and clear
my bathroom mirror
one last time.

I will see my face
in the clean mirror.
A song will play,
a song that did not exist,
was not composed,
the first time I cleaned
this mirror. A song will play.
My face will blur
when I spray the mirror,
My face will streak
when I wipe the mirror
with paper towels
that did not exist
when I first wiped clean
this mirror with other paper towels
which are now long gone.
The mirror will stay.
A song will play.
My face will not stay.
My face that was thin is long gone.
My jowls that are now fat will be gone.
My tetchy forehead, waxy and rough,
my sketchy scleredema grown,
my image from the mirror will be gone,
nice dream, this clear mirror clean.
I will use one of the paper towels
to also clean my eyeglasses
which I will adjust to my face
while I look at myself in the mirror
one last time before I am gone.

And after 30 days, lets not kid ourselves,
maybe this will happen on the 31st day
or on the first day after the 30 days,
a person will walk inside this space
and they will instruct other people
to replace the stained carpets,
to paint all the walls white,
and the other people will paint
the walls white and the new carpet
will be beige and unstained.
They will clean the bathroom mirror
even though the bathroom mirror
was already clear and clean and spotless.
Only the mirror will know.

This is the fate of all the mirrors,
to know that they will be cleaned
free of dirt and dust and spots
until broken when struck.
The fate of all mirrors is to break
into pieces when struck,
this all the mirrors already know.

The water knows.
Rivers are crossed by people
walking and driving
to and fro.
Sometimes the water is damned,
dammed up, at times the water
does not flow.
Lightning strikes the ocean
and the ocean shrugs.
Bridges are built by men, bridges built
to cross these bays and cross these rivers
but not all men get across these bridges
as built, le mot juste.

In 30 days, I too will be gone
and I have many bridges over rivers
which I have to cross, bridges through
which I have to get across. Sail.