My hollow has a metal sound.

My hollow is sounding this way: A hinged flap clangs,

tapping against its empty cylinder. There are cinders in the tender

trap I laid yesterday

to catch a glimpse of a gleam. The gleam leaped from a small crinkle

in the steel, and got free before I could show it how much

I loved it.

Then, I closed my eyes. When I close my eyes, I can see

flares of color. Monday, it isn’t blue, it’s red,

a ruby splatter creeping

its stain of warmth to the very edge. Tuesday, it’s blue. Tuesday is

a sapphire pool slowly spreading its wet to cool off Monday’s hot.

Today is Wednesday. That gleam was

supposed to be my yellow. Without it, what I see slips back into a black

velvet landscape they’ve re-placed inside a cheap aluminum frame.

What I see in it is

what I saw on it, when the black was more sheet-metal gray, and it was and is

a wounded robot hand-painted white to wander

across the wastes where my human mind

once played with colors. It’s collecting glints off smooth-faced

granite with its sensitive sensors for eyes. They’ll help fill its hollow,

a hollow suddenly sounding less metal.