Drinking Fernet-Branca in the Dark

Feeling very much in charge of a glass
of Fernet-Branca. Very much feeling the silk
rabbit of it charge the sinuses, the mouth

of the kitchen window yawning wide over
the neighbors’ backyard where “Dear Frederique”
laces the pool speaker, an undead gloss of light

on the emphysemic celosia—Hey bunny,
I feel like I was with you there, don’t you?
Weren’t we at some party, didn’t I take

the dewy pool cue? Back then the midnights kept
falling at the same rate I crossed the pale
cobblestones that looked like smoothed-down skulls

and I still feel how I plaited my hair and soared
in slow-mo down an escalator in my white
crepe pantsuit, caught the Cokebottle glance

of a stranger asking Where you off to? I still
don’t know, but I remember descending
to the hotel lobby with those urns of fervor-green

shingle vine clinging at the wall, their strands
gathered in midair as if held by a fist—
so quiet then, and the faint gunpowder scent—

like wasn’t everyone off fighting something
save for me? Yes, everyone was fighting something
save for me, knee deep in the koi pond kissing

my own hand, watching Nosferaten fog spiel
from the smokestacks and cigar cherries ferment
to must. Helicopters corseted the sky and even then

I felt so very wholly strollingly in charge
of my thimbleful of Fernet-Branca—I tongued
its garnet, ate its mums. Like I was underwater.