Creative stuff. To enjoy.
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Beautiful things?
How can you ignore
ugliness to find beautiful
things?
I cry, rake a pillow
with brittle nails, the
sound of cloth ripping—
feathers everywhere!—like
a cold winter.
Now I sleep in a flat bed
and, restless, fall out.
The cracks in the ceiling,
like roots spreading.
Is it Spring already?
Hot damn!
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“You know, son, life is a business.”
—T.L.
Now I know why
owners think we are ants
like numbers
like percentages.
Take a long look
from the thirty-fourth floor
down at the street.
What do you see?
Ants,
about their daily breadcrumbs.
If you were an owner,
locked in an airless cell
as your yellow window stared
at flat black streets,
and every day,
you saw those ants
bustling
wouldn’t you believe that too?
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“Shake out carols!
Solitary here, the night’s carols!”
—Walt Whitman Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking
Begin round,
green and speckled brown.
Twist in amber veins.
Weave in lucent skeins, bore
toward the dark middle, that hide
spinning wights, tangled nights.
In sleep.
Wrapped, bodies gathered,
tingling slow,
time groans, cells divide.
Within the bud,
under night mud,
something yawns,
stretches,
thrusts tendril fingers up from beneath
and listens, feeling the breeze breathe.
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Sit on the chair,
cling, lascivious, to silence.
The warm cup nestles,
warms the hand.
Peace passes through veins
and surfaces on skin,
bringing goose bumps.
Clothes soak in soap.
The heater, buzzes, ringing.
This cup
is all I’ve asked.
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Shadows of figures
spread on the slate,
tremble at dusk’s onset,
move along the way.
Shadows of figures,
stretch, fade, grow gray,
as the light weakens
move along the way.
Shadows of figures,
silenter than leaves,
leave not a whisper
move along the way.
Shadows of figures,
spread on the clay,
tremble at dusk’s onset,
Move alone, away.
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I walking Earth trod on
by all. I am floating cloud
gray changing. I am
fat mountain born not of seed.
You passing rain, fallen
in the eyes and swimming fish
silver. Borne you were
of stone and feathers and blood.
We tear core from peach
plunge bodies in the fruit.
Let the juice run down our faces,
and lick our wounds.
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First one,
two, three
the hail
taps, falls.
The hail
walks
the roof.
After it all happens,
it will
fall, ever so:
First one,
two, three
and comes the sound
of footsteps
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I, lepidopteran,
touch from branch
to side of cold pool.
Reflect in the glass water.
Antenna, ganglia dangle.
questions answered by
flash of color,
silent flutter.
When you found me, I was heavy,
face pressed against dry leaves.
You lifted me in your arms
smashed your lips against my lips.
You breathed for me,
filled me with breath.
Deep inside, the light stirred—
the sun began to throb.
Fingers deepened and uncurled
and pale shoots filled with light.
Now leaves pulse in the green wind
and flowers thrust with want.
holes in the cardboard
frame, yellow, brittle,
eaten by insects
they dance, frozen
patterns of silver nitrite
on cracked paper
soon gone.
already changed.