LOUISE MATHIAS was born in England and raised in Los Angeles. Her  poems have recently appeared in Quarterly West, Boulevard and Salt Hill.  She lives in Long Beach, California. According to Experts Mother Earth is an ever-reducing planet. Via internet, airport, a canopy of nerves & roaming charges. Your faux-faux cousin gives you a new Italian toy: "Expatriate-in-the-Box." All wound up he cries "Bella, Bella." I prefer romaine, one aunt says, her arms and legs dangling from her dress like Popsicle sticks, all the cream sucked off by Aunt #2, who in direct contrast to the earth is ever-expanding. In years past, I used to try to sign my name with festive flourish; take up space. These days I'm a one question woman. What's Italian for brevity, grief? Conjugal                      (Everywhere we've been is darkly wooded.) When did so many trees spring up? How did the city grow hair?                      Quick, count her fingers & toes. Make sure                      there aren't too many – A classic dream is the lyrical dream: The small blue alcove above a prisoner's head is falling / failing (as only sky knows how). These choices – these un-choices. How to eradicate their source?                      The car was leaving when I got there.                      It was just a woman's leg.                      Her leg. Ephemera – (the art of collecting) disposable goods. Very magpie of you darling, very. Ghost Limb Not death, but a version of it. Quixotic nurses visit at night, like angels, but harder. Question: sounds like refrigerator. Answer: respirator. My family tree cut short, more of a shrub. The mother country's breath smells foreign like babies. What to wear? What to wear? A net of stars and then a cape of smog.