You’ve Evolved More Elaborately than Anyone Else

Leaving you at the motel
with two hairy men, I’m ashamed
to feel so pleased with myself.
They take turns undressing you

to discover which organs you wear
closest to your skin. Because
you’ve evolved more elaborately
than anyone else, those organs

defy anatomy textbooks
and so puzzle the hairy men
they leave with their faces aflame
and their wallets flat as postcards.

Rain blows in from the harbor
and ignites the motel’s neon sign.
Trees sigh with vegetable pleasure
much greater than human passions.

Back in the room I find you packing
your skeleton into a suitcase
for further reference. Your spirit
flutters about like a mayfly,

tittering. The hairy men left
fingerprints greasy as pancakes
on every surface except your skin.
The room reeks of their cologne.

We divide their cash and credit cards
and agree that ten years later
we’ll meet here again. We’ll lure
two more hairy men still deeper

into your evolution and see
if anyone can survive such
finely textured notions exposed
so frankly in such tepid light.