A cat with no face appears in the window--and I’m on the third floor in here.
The houseplants are whimpering little blades
that chatter like prisoners.
She’s pregnant--belly full ‘a eyeless numbers.
She grooms her fur with her little jackknife of a tongue, and I tremble.
Can’t help but think this is a
threat of some sort, some implication
at my demise.
“I’ll call the fucking cops!” I shout.
Then
without much noise, a woman enters the room
and lets her clothes
slide off
like ice sheets melting into the Arctic.
“What on earth is it?” She asks.
“You look concerned.”
11.17.2008
11.07.2008
The Something
The thought has a thing, and sun is a blinking eye
Coerced into the long stare at her children. Wind pauses
For reverence at our eulogy, as if anyone cares,
Which if brief, formal and boring.
Pigeons throw their voices like ventriloquists, a
Boy bounces one green grape infinitely.
This memory as thought as thing; the idea as
being a thing once
And only once;
A blind man rolls a cigarette and invents language.
What’s the difference? He’s been sold, but a useless slave.
He does not remember a motel outside Pittsburgh.
The dark cozies up to the dark there. Only our night continues.
In the night, there are not only pictures, but figures.
Not many nights but one after the other. A sequence of nights.
And imagined forms, and nostalgia.
Memory clips the wings of the ocean. A certain
Immaculateness brightens them, hurries us along to the water.
Brownish white, Egypt crawls out of the cave
With its body wrapped in sack-cloth.
The stars are merely pygmies.
Coerced into the long stare at her children. Wind pauses
For reverence at our eulogy, as if anyone cares,
Which if brief, formal and boring.
Pigeons throw their voices like ventriloquists, a
Boy bounces one green grape infinitely.
This memory as thought as thing; the idea as
being a thing once
And only once;
A blind man rolls a cigarette and invents language.
What’s the difference? He’s been sold, but a useless slave.
He does not remember a motel outside Pittsburgh.
The dark cozies up to the dark there. Only our night continues.
In the night, there are not only pictures, but figures.
Not many nights but one after the other. A sequence of nights.
And imagined forms, and nostalgia.
Memory clips the wings of the ocean. A certain
Immaculateness brightens them, hurries us along to the water.
Brownish white, Egypt crawls out of the cave
With its body wrapped in sack-cloth.
The stars are merely pygmies.
Mercurial Darkness Society
What
I heard then
when the rain struck
the leaf
blinked. When the
giraffe
child slid out,
opened her eye for the first time,
fanned
those lovely coveted
lashes. When my movement
loved its
movement’s clone
in the moonlight;
in you, asleep.
The stars
trembled
on the ceiling. They do
not
talk amongst themselves. They
do not tell
secrets—they have no secrets
left to tell.
I heard then
when the rain struck
the leaf
blinked. When the
giraffe
child slid out,
opened her eye for the first time,
fanned
those lovely coveted
lashes. When my movement
loved its
movement’s clone
in the moonlight;
in you, asleep.
The stars
trembled
on the ceiling. They do
not
talk amongst themselves. They
do not tell
secrets—they have no secrets
left to tell.
11.03.2008
Gamey Altitude
This dining room is mouse bin dusty.
The staff’s a bunch of old egg-eyed buffoons
with yellow heads and chalk hands.
What would it take to get a glass of water in this dump?
I signal one of the geezers
and persuade him to pour me some.
When it comes out, instead of ice
there’s a couple teeth clinking
around in there.
Not human teeth—more like the molars of a tiger,
an ocelot, or some other of the large cat
family.
Of course, I’m none too happy. I curse the waiter
and his elderly mind. In response, he points at a nearby table.
At it, there is a sitting man. A traveling salesman, I’m told,
with rotted rubber shoes and sewn shut eyes. He’s deaf
the geezer tells me, and hands me a card.
“See you in the afterlife,” it says.
The staff’s a bunch of old egg-eyed buffoons
with yellow heads and chalk hands.
What would it take to get a glass of water in this dump?
I signal one of the geezers
and persuade him to pour me some.
When it comes out, instead of ice
there’s a couple teeth clinking
around in there.
Not human teeth—more like the molars of a tiger,
an ocelot, or some other of the large cat
family.
Of course, I’m none too happy. I curse the waiter
and his elderly mind. In response, he points at a nearby table.
At it, there is a sitting man. A traveling salesman, I’m told,
with rotted rubber shoes and sewn shut eyes. He’s deaf
the geezer tells me, and hands me a card.
“See you in the afterlife,” it says.
Night Of Abandoned Planets
Big-headed, crying babies
of previous
nights haunting
worlds
of ice--once romantic
vistas.
I sit in a plain white chair and wait
in my father’s pajamas.
Wait for the object of my future
to arrive, roly poly,
in its ill-fitting summer suit. Wait
for the snarling animal to sniff my limbs and lick them clean.
I am
A
small, murdered eye in a box. Clothes
pins worked around
my various openings.
Someone, of course, invented me. But their
tracks have been thus covered well. And
the identity of this scientist is so distant, it
isn’t even there.
of previous
nights haunting
worlds
of ice--once romantic
vistas.
I sit in a plain white chair and wait
in my father’s pajamas.
Wait for the object of my future
to arrive, roly poly,
in its ill-fitting summer suit. Wait
for the snarling animal to sniff my limbs and lick them clean.
I am
A
small, murdered eye in a box. Clothes
pins worked around
my various openings.
Someone, of course, invented me. But their
tracks have been thus covered well. And
the identity of this scientist is so distant, it
isn’t even there.
Pinochle Time
It’s when you realize how basic you are.
How much you really need.
Bravery, yes, but also
sadness in all these little choices,
the trivialities.
When our minds are unnecessary, or simply unused.
In the pinochle time, the milk
drinking time.
In the waiting to fall asleep time.
In the breakfast, lunch and dinner time. Fruit
salad time. Time with no noise. Time with
ice and a straw.
Time waiting for test results.
Time that
reminds you it is there. The time in between
visits to cemeteries.
The time we spend catching our breath
at the tops of the stairs. Or removing nail polish,
or celebrating holidays
like Thanksgiving, and New Years.
The time we think we lost but never had.
Spent studying geology, dissecting a piglet, looking
through a telescope.
Mourning.
The time on a mountain. The time
of war, envy or jealousy. Of our treacherous
stabs at love. Whereas, most of us,
our love is so imperfect
it does more harm than good.
How much you really need.
Bravery, yes, but also
sadness in all these little choices,
the trivialities.
When our minds are unnecessary, or simply unused.
In the pinochle time, the milk
drinking time.
In the waiting to fall asleep time.
In the breakfast, lunch and dinner time. Fruit
salad time. Time with no noise. Time with
ice and a straw.
Time waiting for test results.
Time that
reminds you it is there. The time in between
visits to cemeteries.
The time we spend catching our breath
at the tops of the stairs. Or removing nail polish,
or celebrating holidays
like Thanksgiving, and New Years.
The time we think we lost but never had.
Spent studying geology, dissecting a piglet, looking
through a telescope.
Mourning.
The time on a mountain. The time
of war, envy or jealousy. Of our treacherous
stabs at love. Whereas, most of us,
our love is so imperfect
it does more harm than good.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
