Corinna Schulenburg 

Rasp Fugue 

the coughs, they breed 
in the corners of Russell Sage playground, 
I saw them once, blooming 
like early daffodils, yellow and brown 
as ripe bananas, huddled together 
and spooning into each other's mouths 
as we took cover from the meteors 
which fall now, every day or is it 
every other day 
the kids, they blink 
like little moles coming out the shelters 
we built for them at Yellowstone playground 
jury-rigged from the cut tongues of slides 
and the coughs, they canter 
across the very skin the sun hunts, the sun 
which flares now, every hour or is it 
every other hour 
the officers, they swing 
a soothing violence to keep the time, 
circling the playgrounds in measured steps, 
and the coughs, they say pick me, 
and they are plucked up from beet-red roots 
and hover, diaphanous above us, then burst, 
as we offer murmurs of "I hope  
this email finds you well" to the faces 
which fade now, every breath or is it 

Breakfast 

Somewhere there is  
another me 
who cracks her eggs  
perfectly 
and who pities this me  
a little as we  
branch away 
across the multiverse, 
but only a little. 
That other me has no time 
for pity.   
Great things  
arrange themselves 
before her, righteous 
as well-flipped omelets, 
while I sit, now almost out  
of sight, and eat  
around the bits  
of broken shell.