SCAFFOLDING

The woman in the painting had fallen off the fence between Monday and Tuesday.

She pulled the blanket of stars down to examine them, one by one, burning her fingers.

When she touched her face, a halo blossomed with the smallest white butterflies.

She was trying to see Wednesday, but the scaffolding of beliefs crumbled.

The holiest week had quarantined sorrows braided with deaths and silences.

She would tightrope Thursday without alarming the others with disturbing visions.

The vacation proved a myth, the drama consumed tragedy, the students couldn’t sit still.

All saints were dead but resurrected into the fame of postage stamps.

She knew that to be unseen could be dangerous; poverty required discipline.

The book she carried glared potentially useless, a score for uncomfortable feelings.

With cello accompaniment—a chorus of women wailing, glaciers breaking.

The robots were warned not to be overly human; that the ego had shallow pitfalls.

After all, one wanted to be something more than a conglomeration of footfalls.

The footnotes to Friday distilled the chaos into unfinished meanings.

Weekends were canvases that glared with a tenable vocabulary all their own.

Not to touch another proved more problematic than anticipated, foreseen.

The viewer was confused but curious about the delay of movement, the broken song.