What distracts her from the pins speech also spills

in a street line.

To settle this dispute she tells the room,

“did you know today is the

longest day of the year?”

Deterioration

sounds a lot like nothing.

I try with: do you miss

all the heaviness involved?

                                                                                          something’s

                                                                                 happening to

                                                                                      me … babies lived

                                                                                     here

                                                                                                                         I swear

                                                                                                                       they do.

An exegete would look

and say:

this is almost her remembering

a closeness.

That was the speech her foreign-looking boss wanted

to make the day he gave her

her first needle.

Perhaps his first grave

mistake.