60 (take two)

A tree set on fire with invisible flame. The in- before visible is not the in- before flammable. In case of fire, break glass, also invisible in its way. Glass fronts the memory box. One laughed to hear the phrase “glass student.” As a child, I had a see-through plastic woman I opened up. She was like my wooden map of the states when I put each in its place, except they refused my eyes passage. Livermore labs and Heart Mountain were left for later on. He snapped at my “philosophizing,” said he couldn't bear one more minute of it. Meditations, like documents, come in boxes. I have records of emails, attempts at blackmail. You say you have a match, but I have fire retardant. The poem is glass; its edge can frame or it can cut a man.

--18 April 2015