after Tomaž Šalamun

Katie Rauk is an adjunct instructor.
Katie Rauk is a supernova eating up lesser stars in the sky.
She corrals her cart in supermarket parking lots.
She forgets to keep Kleenex in her purse.
People and I, we shake our heads.
Maybe she is a lion.
Maybe she once skied 55 kilometers with a baby on her back.
They say she will maybe qualify for health insurance
during spring semester. Possibly
she’s a comma in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Possibly she should be punished.
Her photo taken. She often stands in line at post offices
and sees her faces on the wall.
Next year, she will burn the fields.
Next year she will be the field.
Each one of her classes is a revolution
of sentences, their tiny gears whirring like seeds dreaming in earth.
What do you get when Katie Rauk sits in a cubicle wearing winter boots?
History.
Look! This is Katie Rauk!
She cuts words out of magazines. Some she shares,
some she keeps to herself.