1955 Rauschenberg Bed
Pull on a thread and the bed
unmakes itself.
Tug a stitch and initiate
an unquilting bee.
Last night your hair fell out
and scribbled all over the pillow,
mouse-gray head hairs
dangling white sheet threads,
each hair crossing out
fibers by fives.
You’ve left your stingray
mouth here too,
its bottom lip sticked
snapper red.
Down the covers slide mucus
blood and moonrays in a bedhead afterbirth,
past sheep white as sheets
against sky,
wagging their shirttails
behind them.
You’ve made your bed now
(hang it all) on the wall.
What a life we’ve slept here -- hair
blood and sun in the sheep-blinking earth,
thick and glorious
in your wet-paint dreams.