There are no cattle in Abilene.
I expected cattle.
I thought they trafficked in cattle in Abilene.

I’ve chosen to take the stairs.
It’s harder, but quicker
than waiting for the elevator
which seems eternally stuck on R—Roof.

It’s a little later. And very dark and quiet now.
A few scattered lights penetrate the empty distance.

City emptiness terrifies—even without the stars.
I mean —the blankness—and silence—have force: gravity.

That it could all come down 
to a man in a room 
empty but for

We ate alone in the immense dining room.
My mother got me to eat each night
by saying any meat was buffalo meat.

To take advantage of the January thaw, I walk
uptown to savor the grapefruits and green
peppers in the winter light, then, returning, turn

I finally broke down and opened the shoebox
which arrived just weeks after my father died.
All winter I had put it out of sight on top

The old man is back.
The house reeks of bacon.
The Jews next door

I am never lonely and never bored. Except when I bore myself, which is my definition of loneliness—to bore oneself. It makes a body lonesome, that.

We have a house. There is a roof and there are windows. I think they are square. You can see through them, that’s for sure. There is a door to go into and out of the house. It works both ways. And oh, a floor.