The basement suite is leaking in my brain,
connectors wet, though advertised brain-tight.
My mentor, ice in her cup a rattling rain,
from cancer-dark names me formidably brainy.
I rustle into the paper bag of childhood,
and touch the slick sweet jelly of sour brains.
You take my photo on the crumbling train,
both lenses clicking into place, brain-sure.
The camera’s velvet dark exhales, I grin,
the box will keep our little fading brainlight.
The cat won’t sleep, she settles on your side,
we form a puzzle, rumbling and brainless.
Who are these queer mammals, so well-trained,
by the wild thoughts of others named and brained?
Jes Battis teaches literature and creative writing in the prairies. They are the author of The Winter Knight and the Occult Special Investigator series with Penguin, as well as I Hate Parties with Nightwood Editions.
