This is a place I hardly know, few rules, nurturer
against the spectre, deli cheeses and corduoroy caps,
large rooms with black cats on the walls,
bottle collectors all time of day -- electricians
and shopping carts.
We don't smoke in the front entrance corner-street house
the smoking chair
an affair beside the plants
nobody waters
sunflower dance across the cieling
windows open year round
Blood around us this time of year, sleigh rides
and truck parades, the holiday season
where Norwegians light-up in coral hawaii mango bars
a sixty-year week on Hokkaido, cheap gifts nobody uses.
I play this game: empties add up
liquor beer and wine
set outside beside traffic
I smoke in the smoking chair
in the room where nobody smokes, ears grounded
for the man who will tinkle the empties
back to the liquor store, a five dollar discount
towards a tax most of us pay, a cheap vacation
across town, free gas, a free rattle in the socket
outside the room where nobody smokes.