Pizza shop (1)

Nick Rattner

To stand before
an oven as though
sweat was an alphabet
to spell a second
name, to stand there
until the stink poured
from my skin, to
work as though to be
reborn to work,
to be who never takes
a piss, to take
my place, to be easy
to replace, to be
saved and never
told from what,
to make what I was
told to make, to
make myself the un-
breaking shape of
being made, to be dry
erased from the music
of days the schedule
says are mine, to grind,
then, in the mountain,
time, to be arms
that move in time
to “Landslide” or “Night
Moves,” to crew,
to Michelob in the jean-
and-T performance
of a Marb, to unwind,
to find the wanted
ache, to milligram, to
shake the weed
out of this bag,
to a little bump,
a little blow,
to rest on concrete
steps, threshold,
staining them with spit,
to heading home
to lay down inside
the worn-out hour
left, turning then
before the scheduled
dark to taste a bloom
dried on my arm
of sweat.