Tilt Your Head Back

Tilts his head back to administer the eyedrops,
then swings it forward and down when the stinging begins,
a brief but pleasant burst of vertigo as the unchambered fluids slosh
from one section of the braincase to another

head droops and minutely lurches to the
ponderous beat of a lumpen heart
he wonders, apropos of nothing
if there isn’t some
lamplit alleyway in a city or town
near the Mediterranean coast
where someone is vomiting,
sickened by drink or tainted shellfish.
This isn’t the much-vaunted ‘Sense of Wonder’,
but merely frank, workaday wonder.
Note: they are the same thing.