The morning hangs with pancakes

The morning hangs with pancakes
searing with hot rays. I awake
to the smell of burnt butter,
from that shop ‘round the corner.
Would it be bad to lie about being sick again?
There’s something really punching,
poignant about the noise from Warner Avenue–
people punching brakes and old women on street corners;
pungent, but I sort of crave it–
like the after-regrets of binging
on warm pancakes until your father says,
“Maybe you should go to the mall and
get those pants a size bigger…”
I’m just going to lay and lie
and act like I don’t need to live,
while cars zoom by and exhaustion
smokes through my window…
but the blinding squares of light,
the 8 a.m. jitters,
smother my face like my pillow.
It’s not really a lie that I’m ill–
but I slouch and sludge and decide to arise
to the capsizing sound of Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get it On”—
an appropriate reminder that I am alone
and that there are sirens outside.