I dreamed my shadow left to find
its way alone. It jumped the moon
in a puddle by a curb and leaped
its greasy shadow leaping there.
It climbed a house and curtained down
upon a family of flesh-stalks gathered
by an almond tree, talking politics.
It eavesdropped on the uselessness.
I let it gleefully go as if it were
a thing of the past, its fortunes shot,
or a prayer or hymn or curse I left
in church or at the farmer’s market
where plums and pomegranates shine:
go, my shadow, and unbenison them.
I’m glad to live without you. Fasten not
your drear promise to me again.