if this city is still breaking me
in with its weather and tethered eye
you be the arch in my neck
the mane growing from it
and the wind running through it
with you I be rampant as a joke
off a tongue that’s off the clock
when my master come as the cold
the wet the leering staggering men
I ask I be insulated and I ask I be
invisible like a tuber like a sock
gagging on its kin in a swell of beige
and you sweat-spent and tattered
street smart serving second term
fold me in a new way