"what do you do?"

" what do you do? (they often ask me): I say nothing back (sometimes): or else

I say instead (sometimes): nothing:

                                                        other times I say: too many things to tell you

(but nothing that matters: and nothing that matters to me): (considering that,

shillyshallying, nothing matters to me): (I'm merely following, oftentimes,

this hushed hush-hush of a whisper whirring inside me, weakly, no longer even

turning into word, phrase, verse):

                                                     I seek an end, in the end:




From My Life I Lap It Up (Oberlin College Press, 2018). All rights reserved. Reprinted with the permission of the translator.