You are this
which is not
that,
that
which is not
this.
You owe such and such
to whoever and whom,
“This Tree,” “Death Dream” and “Society”
I stop walking,
and contemplate
the way the thin
arm of this tree
once bent upward,
before stretching
out over the river.
“Cactus,” “cutlet” and “pumpkin”
I wait for a sign that you need me:
a wilting arm, dry soil,
but you give me nothing
so I trickle water into your mouth.
Just enough to tame my own thirst.
read more...“Binge-Watching a Dream,” “To Tell the Truth” and “The Moment and the Sequence”
When he awakens, the dream tucks itself in.
At bedtime, the dream starts the night shift.
And so
Inside the lazy contraction of slumber is an energetic stretch.
“We Take Our Color From The Mines,” “The Sea Was Never A Friend To Us” and “We Are Forced To Face One Another”
We take our color from the mines;
A frost of ash atop our coarse dark hair.
With brimstone flecks in the linarite of our
eyes, We see what lies in darkness—
Black holes to hell.
read more...“the colonel,” “hunt simulacrum (Iceland 2040)” and “Hastings (1060/2018)”
was in high dudgeon the colonel yelled
lying flat your pug-rasps in
in petering
juxtaposition of stuttered blasts
out get out
“The Concept of Order,” “That Hurt” and “Wolfwomen”
As a species, humans
live their lives in degrees
of alarm. Mostly, for most
of us, there isn’t much.
The world spins exactly
as we have come to expect it,
and caught wherever
we are,
“I was a tourist from honey-milk land,” “Inheritance” and “Overflowing”
I was a tourist from honey-milk land,
and Sister heard my question underneath.
She had her own.
“Are you packing?”
That kind of place.
The nun hugged her wizened chest.
She was old then,
dead now, I’m sure, thirty years on.
“The Red French Balloon Proposal,” “Her Tear Ducts Were Fuel Cells” and “exspiro”
In 1979 or so
Soviet-French
interplanetary
cooperation
(which boasted,
inter alia,
French scientific
tackle lugged
to Mars by the
USSR in 1971)
nearly hit
a new high
with an idea;
“Cursive,” “The Phone Calls” and “Death Can’t Stop the Rap”
A declaration from the district office
we will not be teaching cursive this year
no pens will be required, no extra paper
we will not be teaching cursive this year.
“Rose of Mary,” “Taking Christmas Down” and “Perigee”
My mother’s pots of rosemary were tall, manicured
cones, broom swept earthy smelling evergreen,
flecked with lavender drops of blossoms
the shape of small hearts or lips,
she’d send me outside to retrieve a stem each time
she baked a chicken
“Ready to Go,” “So Carry On Still” and “Becoming”
a wobbling chin and her deserted glance hit the floor
in agony where we stood together while we chanted
misery: “you’re an ordinary man.” her mouth wrenched
an unforgettable sound cataclysmic eruption of scattered
emotions, broken speeches, tired and beaten hope
we were once before and not anymore but why
“Late Seventies,” “Ants” and “And Again”
It’s strange how often
All these years later
I hear this guy
Sprawled big in that way certain
Italian men can be
Cater-corned across from
My solo table in the Boylston St eatery
“Territory of Ladders,” “Elephant Burial” and “Lost Neighbors”
Who were you before ships
became your shoes? Now you sway
on mesozoic legs wondering why
there’s no stability inside. I heard you pierced
ears with knives and severed free thinking
on every continent before.
“Hold Perhaps or Maybe to Land” and “Stage Direction”
At the gallery is The Kiss
– you know the one –
Those two marble lovers, oblivious, entwined,
Stealing a moment never meant to be seen.
Did they know what would come, I wonder.
Do you know they had names?
“The Unwritten,” “Our Messy Shoes” and “William”
They don’t write many books
about when the love dies
I tell em’ to picture the river
washing over the familiar rocks
The pull we feel to abandon
any sense of continuity
Our broken compasses
Our broken bastards
“Traveling Through Lightning,” “Night Creatures” and “Wind Chimes”
traveling through lightning is
disorienting
I am here
I am not
all this living is more electrifying
when the sky trembles
with light
“December 4, 2012; Eleven Days Until Christmas,” “February 14, 2018; A Sunny Day” and “We’ve Seen Too Much”
A picturesque day
in Newtown: scattering
clouds danced joyfully,
making playful shapes,
monkeys and rhinos
followed the children
from car to classroom.
Sun rays shone warmly
above, soon to reveal
the twenty-six halos of
innocent souls.