Node strums forth self;
transcendant calamity
is the eleventh dimension
from main street,
sweetly tucked in
beneath the railroad
ties, or lazing
on the rafters
watching sunset.
Adam eats mangoes
beside me while the sisters
process pizzas. Everyone
knows there’s a wild
ride inside. The light
comes on when the
oven is pre
heated.
gingerly dangling the thermometer over
the cliff to measure the frigid airs spilling
from the earth’s bowels, he realizes he
cannot hit rock bottom because there
is no bottom to hit, least of all his,
here, at the edge of all that matters,
nothing, an aurora blinking in the
shape of a wedding ring he does
not notice in the stratosphere
above him.
He is married to
ice particles floating
upward, scurrying in sympathy
to the volcanic miasma
beneath the ebon
surfaces of rising gases
several kilometers below
the ice shelf.
If I take this thing seriously I will
do this and that
and be that person and
send to that publisher or
show in that gallery.
Overall the process
tires me, grievously.
But I wander forward
interested because
this is life, and therefore
punctiliar feelings
punctuate my every
crossing a railroad track
in bedroom slippers.
The brush from a stern
pheasant across winter
sky adds dash to a spry
wit from last year’s black
hole finagled mango
cosm.
It was the
monasteries that decided
to divvy up the day into
tiny pieces, a prayer for
this, a song for that.
I say it like it’s a bad thing.
In context, it’s a symphony,
belting out with Gregory in the front row
chosen to be renewed among the packs of
fogged renters, a multiplicity
of beauties this pipe organ
jamming in Dorian
and even its wheezes
are angelic sneezes
But when you bring the tin-brained cat
out of the clover field, you realize that
she doesn’t know where she is and
you are forcing time into tiny bundles
that don’t really exist and don’t know
where to go. Rivulets of unweaned
meaning try to focus around bolsters
of steel-reinforced concrete that smell
of oil and bad, old food. And the result
is what you see on the plate -
limp salad and ragweed,
forests of it, on fire,
for miles.
The hour will not leave you, walking
in the mountains to cleanse yourself
from toxins of awkward toil. Time
rolls outward in all directions, smoothing
ripples of earth and stone, never within.
Worn incisors and aching joints tell cycling moons.
Twisted flint stings your nostrils in a miasma
of wry wind-down; remember what and who
you are beyond twilight shadows of fetal games’
steaming consciousness, knocking together ideas
over dry moss to start a flame, a nameless ancestor
knelt at just this place to chant over the next day’s kill.
Turn, fire
ply the taws
to the King’s backside, truly
signal a break in the fear
of apogee pursued
by arroyo; storm-scalloped
weather-beaten weeds
ring us, we chant lullabys
to an out of tune guitar
as the coals smolder in the
morning. We are still up,
and bump smoothly on.
of nought her cries to me
when I was ensconced in the power
spectrum narcosis, stretch-lines throbbing
at my temples and my blood squirming
like medusa serpents, radiant telekinetic blooms
for imaginary eternities that you and I inhabit,
just not the way we expected
Feeling military stupidities
To the marrow
Tinsel martyrdoms
For medals or less
Empty spots of
Juice behind unseeing
Eyes
The desert eats you
That stole my heart
As it bleached
My ribcage in
The steady sun,
Maggots and
A coat of magenta
And teal
Reinvention
because you started it
Of the heart
like we’re ever apart
Parts of me
that you made me like this
Electrons spin
and we are together
Madly
Boson orbits
the armpit of
strange worlds
A poem about the lives
of the saints
Drama fused
the linkage of a
flower with the
breaking of stones
a steel toed shoe crushes
pebbles into the hot asphalt
That is you and me down there,
flattened to gossamer perfection,
over a lifetime and into the next,
pancakelike
bridget on the
bridge with
patrick, their
lives entwined like
a tomb of grace,
a resurrection of
possibilities
throw arms around
the fruit of our loving
amid the lowing of
cattle
death is nothing to fear
life is a thing to rejoice in
god is everywhere
most of all in our lungs.
Thus I will bless you throughout my life,
and raise my hands in prayer to your name;
my soul will be filled as if by rich food,
and my mouth will sing your praises and rejoice
Stone
Bone
Work weary
Soiled chasuble
Tired of these
Stone words,
Rejoin the bone dance
With mutters of
Inattention
Talking to oneself
One talks to the thousand others
One is over a thousand
Seconds
Namedrop
Words
Tears
Willow fronds burn
This is my offering
lacking palms, lacking
Peace