Would You Wear My Eyes

By Bob Kaufman

My body is a torn mattress

Disheveled throbbing place

For the comings and goings

Of loveless transients.

The whole of me

Is an unfurnished room

Filled with dank breath

Escaping in gasps to nowhere.

Before completely objective mirrors

I have shot myself with my eyes,

But death refused my advances.

I have walked on my walls each night

Through strange landscapes in my head.

I have brushed my teeth with orange peel

Iced with cold blood from my dripping faucets.

My face is covered with maps of dead nations;

My hair is littered with drying ragweed.

Bitter raisins drip haphazardly from my nostrils

While schools of glowing minnows swim from my mouth.

The nipples of my breasts are sun-browned cockleburrs;

Long-forgotten Indian tribes fight battles on my chest

Unaware of the sunken ships rotting in my stomach.

My legs are charred remains of burned cypress trees;

My feet are covered with moss from bayous, flowing

    across my floor.

I can’t go out anymore.

I shall sit on my ceiling.

Would you wear my eyes?

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posted 13 November 2005