My son’s legs hurt,
he can’t hike or horse around.
He sits in front of the TV, icing
his knees & playing video games.
Here I’d like to admit
the personal lyric is dead,
the lie of the unitary self,
the poet as sensitive register.
Signifiers hit the window
like birds, smearing the glass.
Yes, the personal lyric is dead
but life goes on, ignoring
the avant-garde, the head games
& bad puns. Anyway, back
to the bourgeois subject,
my son’s legs, which hurt
while he directs the wobbly,
red-caped character that signifies
himself acting in the world, this
character that runs everywhere
instead of walking.