LUNCHTIME EPIPHANY

at the buffet I eat salads again 
wearing a button with a picture of a cat 
saying "if I had two dead mice, I'd give you one"
poems by Elizabeth Bishop in my bookish hand

without warning words erupt onto notebook paper:
Be your own gorgeous self
you burn in my sky
like the hot red sun at daybreak

my heart races
and then I rest
licking banana cream pie
from a spoon

11/28/01

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