PILLAR

my grandmother alive

I was drunk

she was nasty.

I asked about ancestors

“We were Condé Nast,”

she said

(the narrow stairs of dementia between us)

and “you’re always

building fences.”

was not looking back

but looking at all

what god didn’t know

is that she had a name

in Sodom.

My own looking

is sometimes longing, sometimes spite,

a kind of sexual

anorexia.

I am still fleeing

my grandmother’s

orphanage.

The whites of our eyes

pure

salt.

to tell me

we are not

Condé Nast,

but with the salt filling

our throats

like stars

(those five-pointed fingers)

wouldn’t you too look

for another metaphor

or for the tornado

inside the pillar?