Poem: Comfort

Does having a certain system, an order of things

when I shower, give me comfort? I suppose it does. The sequence is the sacrament. Starting with

the shaving cream (the soap in a can that comes out foamy, not creamy in any way except linguistically), left to soak

in the bristly beard while other duties are attended to by the Chief Hygenic Officer, whose responsibilities include

all the orifices, crevasses, hidden places, and vast plains of epidermal surface area, all in need

of soap.

Then the hair, if necessary, which is never, but we find reasons to do the unecessary out of the bath, so in it we can’t quibble

when some improving ablution, contained in one of the plastic bottles lined up on floor, like armaments awaiting dark uses, silently convnces us that

a liberal application of whatever melange of chemicals contained therein will

make us better.

I’ve forgotten the shaving mirror part. And some other details.

The point is you don’t want to know everything

about me

or anything. Let there be a little mystery.

Let there be questions unanswered.

When I look into the night sky, as billions before me have, and as hundreds of thousands — millions? — are doing right now, at this moment, this very one that’s now past,

I have too many questions. And that’s all right.

I have a system.

I know how to comfort myself.