Later this evening, blink: cut
the disk of the moon exactly from the sky.
You are driving home along the rim
of guardrail, under the turning blade
that opens your spine like a zipper.
Skin is a shawl over the tight winding
of muscle. Teeth part for the tongue
not in use, revealed of palpitation,
squirming in the cold air.

To drive is a simple operation. Flip
back the eyelid. Approach the edge
of the scalpel, the stillness calibrated
to zero width. Remove your hands
from the wheel and count backward
from 99 to sleep. The sky is smooth,
no constellations, no watermark,
the view of the night with one stroke across
in slide after slide, showing no movement.

When you can see again you will see
your car as a band of light describing
the line of the highway, the time
elapsed as a single moment. This
is how you come home naked. This
is the thread of what you were wearing
unspooled through the black trees.
And this is how you see yourself again.

Your eye is the moon, exactly.