Thrift Shop

down, forgotten blood rushing into

your thoughts. This book must have

been read in a waiting room, someone

the other side of swinging doors, a glaring

whiteness on her body as the masked MD

inserts another tube, while the plot

of the book thickens the way her life

is congealing. But here’s joy in a multi-

colored afghan, something to decorate

yourself with. And this etched glass shaped

like a huge finger, so it’s possible to drink

another person’s touch. The chair you sit in

reclines. Logs burn slowly in a fireplace,

heating a room hung with pictures of Gauguin’s

dusky women, a crackling flame almost the

sound of a cash register, the ping of coins.