Exhibit 13

At risk of seeming rather oddly tipsy,
like a guy with one foot shod and the other sockless,
or a wobbly animal just after it’s been born,
or some other form of locomotive clown
lurching his way past lions and their tamer,
X skated until he was ready to fall over.

Along the way he’d sifted the palaver
of clues and riddles, mysteries and tips,
which sent him round like an old electrical timer
that clicked its way through strict diurnal cycles.
He’d mustered all the strength he had to call on,
surprising himself with the bounds of his mental brawn.

But now he stood before a solid brown
double door, behind which lay the Louvre
of medical oddities. Its simple lobby’s clean
and institutional off-whites, beiges, taupes
recalled to Xavier’s mind the halls of schools
whose walls he couldn’t help but itch to mar.

Voluminous silence, as most befits a tomb or
long-forgotten monastery or barn,
surrounded X, who’d in most cases seek less
stolid settings. Here, as though by lava
frozen in time and space, were countless types
of things from Austin, Bristol, and Cologne—

a zoo of specimens for those who might incline
to spend a Sunday peering at a tumor.
That kind of morbid fascination taps
a well of feeling in even the smallest bairn
who knows that Death will ever work his lever
with bony knuckles grasping scythes or sickles.

X cavalierly christened several skulls—
Colleen,
Oliver,
Tamara,
Brian—
ignoring blithely the descriptions on their tabs,

and moved through tubs of items found at autopsy
(we should be sick less, with all these medical skills):
a malformed brain left floating in a brine,
some physical structures shared by clone and clone
that begged to be inspected a time or two more—
few things could deliver a jolt like the conjoined liver

of Chang and Eng, which now he could see so close
up. X turned to the skeleton he’d come to think of as Colin,
who’d need a truly brobdingnagian pullover,
and be an instant college ball first-teamer,
a colossal Hoya, Tar Heel, Jayhawk, Bruin;
the jaws of scouts would plummet at the tapes.

But even Colin paled before the colon
(which looked to have been steeped in rich tamari):
a massive complication of the tubes
apparently resisted even bran
and would not of its contents yield a sliver,
until it pushed past 40 on the scales.

In placename verses, such as “Toome” or
“Broagh,” or older sagas like The Voyage of Bran
in which a wanderer hikes and rides and sculls,
the speaker plants poetic flags all over,
unearthing local tales that might turn topsy-
turvy the claims of one or other clan:

“This bog-oak barrel Patrick once made beer in…”
“Blah Blah hid here before he became a lifer…”
But this museum’s finds could make one cool on
cromlechs, pyramids, ziggurats, and teepees,
with organs, tissues, muscles, bones, and vesicles
exposing each normal show as a nickel-and-dimer.

For here was a malformed femur like a loofah,
a lady made of soap, some swallowed tops,
bronchial branches spreading out like thyme or
splitting like so many delicate honeysuckles—
such sights had nearly banished from the kiln
of X’s mind the stuff that made him burn.

“Y will have to find some other dupes.
I’m off to find some things to do that suck less.”
He thought of how he’d bring his ire to bear on
his temptress, and how she’d promise to come clean
if he would only wait until tomorrow…
No longer would this errant knight believe her.

[18:00 / resolving / sestina / liver / xaVIer / Mütter Museum]