First little reelings of knowing outer space is inner—
bad sci-fi movie where humans are fleas, or motes of shadow
in the amoeba’s eye(lessness).    I am fairly functional   for a spirit
walking around in a body. I don’t listen to messages,
merely transcribe them, as though the mind is a sphere
scraping other moving spheres
toolbox orchestra of opening
and closing latches, rusted hinges, but when our edges are soft
we allow things in—
become celestial bodies
falling into bed at such little provocation,
mechanical bodies wanting to love
each other with all of our electrons.
Do I love you electron-ically? I think    I do.    Therefore I am.
Today I feel like a robot programmed for the one task
no one needs done anymore. You turned up in my dream again last night,
lifted your shirt, revealing a torso
delineated by planetary circles and orbital arcs
your beautiful drawings grafting themselves onto you
in deep black chalk. And then I was a comet, eating my own tail,
and I couldn’t help moving towards you. I’ll burn
everything I have to dust.

Wendy Cannella’s recent publications include the essay “Angels and Terrorists” featured in The Room and The World: Essays on the Poet Stephen Dunn from Syracuse University Press, and the prose poem “Immortality” selected for a special section of shorts in the 35th anniversary issue of Mid-American Review. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Free Lunch, Phoebe, Southern Indiana Review, Painted Bride Quarterly and Artword, an ekphrastic project sponsored by the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance and Beloit Poetry Journal.