my heart fell out / an aftermath

 
 
                                                                   Because Zachary Schomburg’s poem ‘Haircuts’  &   the performance of it at Poetry Press Week 2016
 
 
 
my heart fell out  / an aftermath 
 
it lay on the floor oozing in sorrow-gauze afterbirth  /  I made a swaddle from my socks,  held it like newborns need   /  its right atrium suckled  my left breast  /  the heart was thirsty  /  it drank milk that wasn’t there   /  its beat, a pier column   /  its rhythm, dragon-boat’s paddles   /  it hummed     a tune from one of its lives   /   like a jig its feet would move to  /  if it were in a cavity that had feet  /   it burped  / from its left ventricle  /  I swear it looked at me  /   a mouthless smile  /  it used to not / smile much / like that time  // it flew into my chest  /  we cried a bit     at the reunion?    maybe,  I’m not sure  /  on the train?  /  yeah, it was on the train  / a man in the seat across from us      me     his eyes, ‘huh?’    /  the little boy next to him  /  he knew  /  he knew he saw   //  the night like sparklers  /  voices vied for the spotlight   /  he knew what he saw  //  I fell asleep and  I was rollerblading