"What Did You Expect?"
"That there would be some Heavenly Father
to dam and to bless, to dole out,
in the parlor of the everlasting, his kicks
and kisses, to say to the soul, Come here, my wretched brat,
or Come here, my darling?
Or that you would be enclosed in the swaddling of the crypt
like a ring in a jewelry chest?
You will not be saved up, you will be exhausted, spent,
in the raptures of the gnats.
The great debauch of possibility is just beginning, for you--
you will be unlimited, you will be
the ears of the fungus listening to the earth go soft.
And you'll never even want to go back
to being locked up in that little black closet called
living."