Roaches

Hail the greasy automatons, hide each circuit of hunger
traced on linoleum--hide toward dishwater and marinara
and back under the radiator.hide A commute from airless blind
walls to a sunfreehide circumambulation of the sink.

Nothing is left unsaid-- hidenothing is said at all;
To know nothing is to makehide true ignorance impossible
because to be unable to acquirehide makes acquisition meaningless.
But still, my mind turns back hideagainst my will

to how you can't quite kill themhide all off neatly because
my whole mind turns like hideten thousand roaches
hundreds and hundreds of times hideevery day and when I'm finished
telling you this, as I amhide telling you this automatic tale,

nothing will have been wastedhide because nothing is ever used.

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© 1991 by Patrick Martin

Originally appeared in The Paris Review.

© by Patrick Martin. All rights reserved. No duplication in any print or electronic format is permitted without express permission from the author.