Lines for painting on grains of rice

For Rebecca You are the kind of  person who buys exotic fruits leaves them out on the counter until they rot You always mean to eat them       sometimes you rearrange them rousing over the bowl a cloud of tiny flies & How do they balance       the parrot who chews a walnut sideways       holding it up in his right foot the owl perched on a just-lit lamppost scratching behind its ear       like a big dog & Your pencil eraser wears down long before the point for every word you write       you rub out two & Where the slice of  toast rested       the plate is still warm a film of fog       little points of dew & Love is like velocity       we feel the speeding up and the slowing down       otherwise not at all the more steady       the more it feels like going nowhere my love I want to go nowhere with you & I cannot bring myself  to toss the cup of cold coffee you set down by the door on your way to the taxi all day I have sipped it       each time forgetting your two tablets of fake sugar       too sweet & Running down the street dodging between raindrops plump as cherries & The ground was feathered with wild strawberries I picked seven       as many as I could bear I ate two       I saved the rest for you       here hold out your hand       take them       taste how sweet & Please hold me the forgotten way the wall pleads spray-paint face and voice of a damned poet the darling damned poets       save them from themselves maybe it is us they need saving from