in a lonely woman’s world
each crack in the walls
is a twinge among the ribs
the neighbors’ footsteps
weigh on her chest when she breathes
if rats teem in the basement
cold shivers climb her back

elsewhere a mother breastfeeds and a child cries
in the lonely woman’s house clocks get rusty
barometers and zippers
everything flows
when it rains her body is like a moist biscuit
from supplies hidden in trenches
by future unknown heroes

far from the city walls
the river grinds the stones slowly
in winter under ice
around loneliness the canopy of heaven
closes like a placenta
with veins from blue stars

the woman files her nails into flesh