Night Porch

I wanted not to chicken out,
                                                  but doubt
left my gaps un-jumped,
                                            and in lieu of courage,
I saw again and again
                                        a surgeon's hand
weave a probe—
                                my whole self mended
and / or ended
                           by a single finger.
Oh, the purple garlic.
                                      Oh, what remains
unfixed,
               such as a heart.

What's the word for impossible?
Was saying to no one the other day.

Nights we watched
                                    the sunset beyond the D
in Donuts
                  in the parking lot behind Kroger.

 
How, when the colors became exhausted
the collection was complete, because
it was a collection of colors,

and the sill appeared deepened especially
for our sketches:

                                 opossum on brown paper,
lighthouse being ornery,
                                           hobby farm gone
into plain dilapidation.

And we,
                being pre-broken-hearted,
flipped script
                        with our loves and our horrors
together,
                 had we made ourselves opaque?
Had we wandered accidentally into pattern?