How is a shirt like death,

before dawn, losing the blackness,

already the spit echoing hoarsely

in the throat, tranquility before

sledghammers, up this early before

anyone to pick pants and shirt?

Is this the shirt you will die in?

Then a shirt is like death, and changes

life. Or is this a shirt you will

advance in, a handsome appearance

for a feeling like lugging stones?

The skin, too, is a pressed shirt,

worns by the roads snarling inside.

A blue road wears a blue cover,

or so it seems; as a red road, red.

To lose your shirt is to lose your

life, a gamble the hooded heart takes

because you are buttoned up in front.