6:36 a.m.

you wrote on the walls
thoughts, poems, shopping lists
manifestos and agendas

your bedroom 
was a printed page
from the ceiling to the floor
i would read it
by penlight
while you slept

your instruments were
colored pencils,
felt-tip pens
you went through
a box of crayolas
as you covered
the kitchen
with small murals
and bright figures

the words would melt
when you cooked

before you moved
it took days to scrape,
erase and repaint

unpublished works remain
under those layers
of paint and wallpaper
like drunken thurber
on the bar room wall

© Ed Plunkett, 2005