the suit is for you

look a flea came all the way 
home with me maybe I’ll train him 
to wear a suit and make coffee 

and wander with me biting only
when he feels neglected you see
fleas feeding on blood is folklore

like plants they live on sunlight or
like bottomfish on food that filters 
down to them bits the perfect 

size after miles and months of
sinking that feels like floating 
uncountable hours fragmenting 

letting oneself be daisied as one 
aims one’s core for that exact 
mouth and maybe an out-of-date 

science book plus drugs is what 
you’ll make of this vision my love
but on that orangepink morning 

when he brings us coffee hot and
not a drop lost despite the jumping 
eighty times his tiny height you’ll

believe me you’ll see him through 
the heavy magic magnifying base
of the pint glass I’m singing this into

AMY BAGWELL

Amy Bagwell’s poems have appeared most recently in Folio, American Literary Review, storySouth, and Smartish Pace and in the collaborative chapbook Wretched Yew (TSP). She co-founded the artists’ residency nonprofit Goodyear Arts and the Wall Poems project, both in Charlotte, North Carolina, and holds an MFA from Queens University.