One by one, million by million, in the prescience of dawn,
every leaf in that part of the world was moved.
-James Agee

The sirens woke me up again. I know they're coming for me
someday, just a matter of when. Count to twenty-five and
yawn. Touch the clock and turn my back against the dawn,
and hope for that one dream of hardware stores with
checkered floors, and buckets full of nails. Or floating,
effortless, over the apartment in a boat, and rowing past the
office windows. Mother, mother may I cry. Father will you
teach me how to die the right way someday. I don't want a
second chance to turn my stuttering reluctance into romance,
with these documents and kindergarten anthems, with my
drunken liturgies. Tune the FM in to static, and pretend that
it's the sea. But four words fumble for the microphone: you
should have known.