I’ve met one named Phoenix Jiránek,
ringleted and effusing “contuition”
as gaily as a Franciscan in a boat
eating honeycakes with an angel.

Thus the Lord showed me both ways,
the austere and the hospitable, are good.

This morning I pray, make my food
honeycomb. Let me feed
on names caught out of solitude:
Cronius, Achilles, John the Dwarf.

Sweeten my awkwardness as I morph
into this weird, glad cloud of witnesses.

Let my shortcomings be laid
at my own door.