After Falling Off a Huge Horse as a Child

And a sprout of a scream came up as a peep
from the great debacle of the basement
where chaos jerked

itself out of the ordering of things
the careful layering of things
the symphonic shelving pattern of things.

And there the laundry lay in mounds and heaps
islands of spandex
and continents of cotton
the detergent oozing into plastic

and the room in the back
with the one bulb of light
hanging over the formations
of crooked couches and the discarded carcasses
of TV sets--
it has no room to breathe
it's too old to remember
an alzheimers room.

There her brother, the ages of soot
and dust falling in insatiable cakes
off his body, emerging

a burial that took place years ago,
underneath his arm like a worm
finding it's way through the soil
through some serpentine cranny
to touch the light
desperately wants the sun.