Fugue

Virginia Woolf, incested

though her childhood, wrote

that she imagined herself

growing up inside a grape.

Grapes are sealed and safe.

You wouldn’t quite float

in one; you’d sit locked

in enough moisture to keep

from drying out, the world

outside though gelid green.

Picture everyone’s edges

smudged. Picture everyone

a green as delicate

as a Ming celadon. Pic-

ture yourself a mollusk

with an unsegmented body

in a skin so tight and taut

that you’d be safe. You could

ruminate all night about

the difference between “taut”

and “tight,” “molest” and “incest.”

“Taut means tightly-drawn,

high-strung. What is tight

is structured so as not to

permit passage of liquid

or gas, air, or light.