(With apologies to Wallace Stevens’ “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird”)

I.

April is the cruelest month,
when youthful hearts with passion burn,
and everyone else must
file an income tax return.

II.

Draft versions of her tax return,
lie crumpled on the table,
stained by her coffee cup,
like pages from an unfinished fiction.

III.

A man and a woman
are one.
A man and a woman and a tax return
are one (if filing jointly).

IV.

She thought secrets
more guarded than diaries
are locked away in our hearts,
and found in our tax returns.

V.

She remembered the old Zen koan:
“What is the sound of one hand clapping?”
And thought of her own:
“What is the sound of a tax return,
in a strong wind, flapping?”

VI.

Over dinner, beside the vase full of tulips,
the lilac-smelling candles slowly burn,
casting massive flower-shaped shadows
upon their white tax return.

VII.

That night she dreamt:
a vivid nightmare about an audit,
a tax inspector saw her tax return,
flying around like a paper airplane,
and he caught it.

VIII.

The tax inspector began with a wicked grin:
“Our data shows that the act of filing
stops most people from smiling.”

IX.

“You look sad, but have no regrets!
The tax you pay will service
the interest on our national Debt,
for at least a few seconds, I’ll bet!”

X.

He took out a magnifying glass and cackled with joy:
“The Income tax is the most awesome tool
that the State can employ:
The power to tax is the power to destroy.’”[1]

XI.

“And what have we here?
I think you’ve been cheating.
You can’t deduct all those steaks
you’ve been eating!”

XII.

In the morning she awoke with profound relief.
No tax inspectors were calling her a thief.
She rushed to her table to review her tax forms,
She checked that she followed all GAAP norms.

XIII.

And finally, with a shaking hand,
she signed the thing
she could not understand.

[1] McCulloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. 316 (1819).