—Jerry Dyer

It’s Monday, and I need
two fingers to start the day.

My feet follow one another
to work.  My job follows
the curve of gravity,
pain’s rainbow,
and by late afternoon,
my life feels
like the dubbed version.

After hours, the sunlight drains
down the boulevard,
and I am cast ashore
at The Bent Elbow.

Behind the bar, Bert
waxes philosophical:
“Between the lift and the sip,”
he says, “fermentation
neither begins nor ends.”

It’s true, nothing enters
our stomachs or our dreams
riding a straight line.
We start breathing, after all,
between the doctor’s slap
and the scream.