They called it the Black Plague.
Cheap casket wine, Pepsi Max,
& forgotten distillery remnants.

I remember the turning—unsure
if it was I or the world that had
slipped its axis (it was both).

A body both growing & shrinking,
swinging between girl & woman,
carried sleeping on broad shoulders.

A wobbly evening stroll past midnight,
climbing through bedroom windows,
of a boy (bound for the psych ward).

There was a panda-bear messiness
to me & on Sunday mornings, the
kookaburras cackled a waking mockery.