book 1 of these poems, "a poet's love," comes out of the schumann/heine dichterliebe mixed with p.j. harvey's album dry. poems got wrote along the lines of schumann's arc (in theory), while listening to the songs on dry (1 song per poem--basically).
book 2, "veronicae," is a re-exploration, pretty much, of the ideas of round 1: a retelling of the story, not of dichterliebe, but of round 1's dichterliebe-inspired stuff.
book 3, "the unpaved," is one step further removed. as the title might suggest, it's going down a road that doesn't yet entirely exist, but it's the same as the first two insofar as it's a road that travels through the same basic territory.
book 4, "prayer-within," is about something, probably. looking back on a turning point and looking forward, and acknowledging both actions to be kind of the same thing, isn't simple, but it's necessary.
book 5, "blank and full," is when i began to look at the bigger form-picture. i realized i need to write 12 sets of poems in order to truly turn their repeating titles into acrostics. the titles have no special value, except that the form makes them acrostacizable. the poems are like breaths, sustaining the structure.
book 6, "red earth," is written to the strains of an incredible composition by elizabeth kimble called autobiography of red, itself a setting of text from the ann carson book by the same name. there are 15 parts to kimble's composition and only 12 titles available for poems, but i'm not letting that bother me. the parts are not looked at sequentially.
book 7, "still life:" i tried to write the whole thing to the song "wildgeeses" off ida con snock, but was wildly unsuccessful. i thought i'd be able to control the repetition this way, but it didn't work. the whole thing broke away from itself.
book 8..."the tic begins." this is a lyric from a helmet song off the album betty. you are welcome for this information hour!
book 9: "arouse alive / a suffering" is from june jordan's poem "queen anne's lace," the second stanza of which goes, "You (where are you, really?) never leave me / to my boredom: numb as i might like to be. / Repeatedly / you do revive / arouse alive / / a suffering." because, hell, i've already abused the creations of artists from richard wagner to harry nilssen; why not add june jordan to this list?
book 10: the structure and sequence of restless mouth is in large part a coping mechanism--that's what keeps it full enough to sustain motion, like a sail in a very specific wind.
book 11: not sure why the titles of these things began to become quotes, but this quote's pretty much from cocteau's opium, a study of a cure that's almost as rigidly formulaic, in its own way, as this...body of whatnot.
book 12: "love is the great good use one person makes of another (daughter polly of the strawberry letter)" is, in some sort of line-ification, a quote from one of niedecker's jefferson poems. i had that book but i lost it.
i thought that the poems might arc back around, as the dichterliebe do, schumann's creation, from what i understand, of a man healed by suffering. the healing i drop into though is not an arc; it is a recurrence, a boundlessness--to feel the same pain over and over, but from a boundless angle, like that one creator's mask in hellraiser. i am a nothing, a substance only; it's pain that redefines me, a whole sanctity of it. schumann's speaker found the weeping flowers, and extrapolated wholeness from them; perhaps this is me doing something similar. even in darkness, something gets done.
when this restless mouth is done, i'm rewriting it, based on the organizational principle of one music album per book (often albums seem to arrange themselves into near-12's, which is convenient). i expect it to start out very similar, to come from the same 12 poems, and then branch out from there. the book names will be the same, or similar; the poem names will be the same. the image would be of a honeycomb, or a library in a borges story.
the poems are organized simultaneously in two ways: 1., vertically, in terms of their being sets of 12 with larger cycle-titles, and 2., horizontally, in terms of there being whatever number of poems that all have the same title. you can scroll down the page and read them top to bottom, or go to the "links" section on the right hand side of the page, and choose a title from it. i used to think this organization was fairly incidental, just something that had happened to make itself available, but now i think it's more than that. still don't know what it means, though.
the awesome image of the tiger above is taken from this deviant art page: http://northmansoatmeal.deviantart.com/art/Tiger-Painting-117868815. because it'e either the tiger or the ladies.
new monster
zinc-white and subtle,
the drag of a blunt nail across a lower lip--
the purples and sables
of your dress--the sineal curve
of your hair
tossed into the wind
that touched
your face.
i stood behind you and that same
wind blew
against me.
remembered perfumes, later,
bright in mind as colors.
lips pressed into a palm like milk.
lips lapping each other.
i said your name
and reached
inside.
raucous freshness
that hot concrete,
minute in detail, by turns sharp and smooth--
i crawled after your shadow.
i was glad to grovel
in the day's sun, which was gray, almost,
in your presence.
i had been tight within myself
always, tight as a seed.
but a hand reached out
of that fiery, turgid depth.
it was a shaken and pale shoot
and it was mine.
i looked at it. it plunged into
the presence of you as if
into water.
look at the cracks in that road.
palpable almost to the eye
in your light, that blue shadow
edged so deep.
like my joy.
watch this hand shake,
with those deep eyes, watch
how you
unfurl me.
dearest
as if i were
a self-planting furrow,
layers of deep earth
folding in over themselves:
in the warmth, i feel,
like your eyes,
rich as dirt.
one time i weeded on an aunt's farm:
the fineness of that soil
it got everywhere. and its moisture.
in the sun it looked deep and endless.
and when touched, it was warm
even in the dark places
warmed only by the sun.
how much warmer i
under your regard?
roses
another word for red
necessitated
by the look
of your mouth.
redefinition of sensation,
my lover:
my eyes change color.
exquisite awkward words:
you understand them all,
doves, flowers,
other flowers,
thorns--
your lips displayed like fruit:
apples, pomegranates, plums.
ruby-red, wine, blood,
breath, saliva,
teeth.
let me redefine
your mouth.
resonance
the waves frequent westcliff drive,
the beaches there--a slow furl, seemingly,
of heavy, heavy water.
that curve mirrored
in the taut lines of roller coasters
at the boardwalk. the curve moves longingly,
as if it were the peel of the air, drawing itself back.
i was shuddering at the top of that spinal
curve, and then plunging down
through air as if it were water.
and after i
got off,
i thought that
these paradoxical
movements
skinned from time
all were once
or would be
yours.
ich grolle nicht
there's nothing to blame,
my dearest. nothing to
it's just that there's so little left.
if i were a god i could write in tongues of flame
and i would say in letters a mile wide that it wasn't
...what i thought.
the taste
of a shadow is
something vile.
as if you were vile,
lover,
as if in the depths of your eyes lurked
white, warped things
that not even the sun of your face
could burn away.
white as zinc.
the flavor of a girl.
no longer to taste
the gravel
your steps
touched.
veronica
this strange building
rhythm, sinuous and
cracked as
a misspelled word.
asleep in the red caverns
of your heart
was a jewel the size of a fist.
it was my love
but it was cancer.
red and ravenous
with jaws like door hinges.
my love,
i wipe my face
on your empty shirt.
zinc metaphor
the equation is simple:
you never existed.
i never
touched your lips.
and i never fit
against your side.
and i never breathed
in
the scent
of your hair.
crawl in, something else,
and strip off this sick zodiac
whiteness. sounds
choke in the mouth;
their zinc white
burns
in the throat.
i hardly can stand this thing
with its weak blue veins like a starved delta.
its thin, thin scalp and
the broken roots of its hair.
the way it flickers
in the mirror
and i see you
sumptuous
there.
i wept in a dream
to think
that
at one sparking moment
in the stream
of the past
i put my mouth
against your shadow
and
that at
one white point
in the night sky of the past
my face rested
against
a wind
that had curved itself
against you.
lover, i hold out my hands
and nothing comes into them.
lover, i hold out my hands and
nothing
comes into them.
milton
i dreamed that
you told me to stop
wiggling my tongue like a snake
in a garden.
and i dreamed that there
were five steps to heaven.
all of them were made from you.
i dreamed a streak of red flourescence
across your forehead--as if i'd marked it
there with a light-laden thumb--
i dreamed only your eyes and mouth
and then dreamed only your sides
and heart.
my limbs twisted
like sounds.
i wondered why
i was the only screaming thing
in a river of fire
that shimmered silent
as a mirror.
quietus
my heart like
a split end.
trim it off
with the fat of memory.
throw it away
and watch the arc it makes in air
as if of your hair.
it wasn't you,
lover, that crawled out
into day,
white skin pimpled with shock
beneath a blue sky.
as if i stripped you even of skin
and wore you,
huddled
within.
in the sanity of moonlight,
moonlight dripping memory,
i draw a zinc-white thumb
across a lip
and wait for night
to dry.
meditations of the beast
beautiful scraps like
the fleeting repetition of a smell:
the sable arc of your fur--
the scarlet of
your curved tongue--
the waft of your breath
as if it still carried
on some honey breeze
into these depths
as if you still
meant
something
inimical--
as if your image
still drifted
on the mirroring shimmer
above this cracked red lake:
skin, or reflection
of heat.
but it's quiet.
my hide in tatters;
this does not matter.
suspended
as if in water,
i wait, patient
in pale state,
for the next scent
to bring back
what i never
had.
new monster
thick white metal
in which i coat myself
thickly: zinc a nail deep.
as if
sheltering
within poison--
my lips a snakebit red,
their juices surging
just under skin,
for you, my spice,
dried in hot memory:
equatorial baking
of your face, your voice--
i slam husks of you against a stone floor,
hoping for shock, to force a chill,
but all that breaks is
my voice--
and it speaks your name,
lips wet
with juice.
veronica. veronica. veronica. veronica. veronica.
raucous freshness
digging toward center,
the seed i
swallowed: your image.
every goddamn root
splits through my red and black--
veins, arteries, corpuscles,
the machine of the earth allegorized in flesh,
the raw root-network of pulses
that unfurls, monstrous, of its own accord,
my body, become your ground.
eyes beating blind, vision ribboned with the
impulse
of your juice:
this
very heart
is yours.
dearest
self-furrowing, these sloughs i dig
through skin.
i vision myself as dirt,
ploughed, the motion of heat in air.
the hot taste of essence-laden breath
hhhhh from upturned earth,
the grinding of the plough.
bah! you were never all i wanted,
veronica.
to turn you inside out,
magma spilt and roiling, blazing surface like a sun
hot on the tongue, eyes stretching,
each eyelash suddenly irradiate,
cheeks scored with fire
under the pressure
of that hot vision--
white to black like the plough of a scream through a throat
and vision a blank and sacramental taste:
veronica, i make myself your earth.
(lover, i hold out my hands and
nothing comes into them.
lover, i hold out my hands and
nothing
comes into them.)
roses
the only thing i remember from a rather insincere study of william carlos williams:
the rose that
drops eternity off
the edge
of each petal--
dripping, eternity comes, sliding thick
from the mouth of the rose and all down its stem.
i push the rose into my mouth
to taste eternity, crystalline like sugar, salt--
it's something to savor,
the absence of
decay, the absence of
the moment,
subsumed
in a lush satin swirl of petals.
my mind, too, can be dirty for you;
watch me contort:
i can douse the rose
deepen its color with moisture,
make its new scent
that of a profound and secret blush.
see how i can make myself
your own, see how i set my lips
into the cavern of your doubled hands--see
how i set up an echo
like the stain the rose traces
on a piece of cloth:
see how i repeat.
resonance
stretch of hand:
the winter-sallow skin,
dry-run, its minimal geometry
broken in light--
the spreading muscles
spinning thin.
over and over--
its involuntary dance
under-familiar.
i plumb myself but find
only freshness.
endless freshness, raw as unspun silk.
the rhythms i knew
gone
the breath that flies my taut chest
broken
like a line of teeth.
what happened to
the things i knew?
scrabble
like mouth on rock,
like seed on the bone-dry plain
to press my face
to the memory of you, but
as everything, shadeless in this newness,
you peel away.
ich grolle nicht
veronica, my star, my sun,
veronica, my root, my heart, my white, my black, my red,
my gravity, my time and space,
my cat, my dog,
my and and the,
my it, my h, my r,
my, my.
(veronica, i was wrong. i was wrong.
but spare me. spare me.
veronica, don't leave me. don't leave me.
think how much i say i love you.
think how much
i love you.)
veronica
drop,
words
down
after
her
as she
sinks
away.
i have not
yet
heard
one word
hit
the
lowest
depth.
zinc metaphor
i like to think
myself
present
and i confess
that this is why
i address myself
to you
veronica.
(deep in the caverns
of my heart
there is a coin.
it has two faces
unchanging
and the metal
in the center
writhes
between them,
turned liquid
under pressure.)
i wept in a dream
beauty is pressure.
this is why, said the greeks,
we drew
figures
from marble.
this is why, said the singers,
we drew
notes
from flesh.
fashioning
petals
from parts;
the attempt
to compress
petals
into flesh.
this is why, like water from a well,
i drew your name
from memory.
milton
a rhythmic knocking
at the smoke-blue tower
of this dream.
i was curled
tighter than a fist,
pressed
closer than a seed,
immured
behind walls
thicker than flexed muscle.
when i breathed
the dream breathed with me.
the hilt of the dream
against my side,
the blade of the dream
deep within.
the tower was small
and blood trailed,
easy as tears,
down its stairs
like a face.
the knocking is
like an invocation.
the knocking is
like an invocation.
quietus
apocryphal intervention of the phoenix:
black hair, blue smoke
curling up from your cigarette.
i don't remember what you said,
but it comes back to me,
the porch light and the porch railing
and the knowledge,
forceless yet infinite, rising, catching fire,
that it was done...
that that which i never had had
was gone.
then i was
excoriate.
now i look at
the wound
and wonder
whether to let it heal.
like words scored
into a tree's bark--an easy if inept metaphor--
your mark,
branded to my tongue:
veronica. veronica. veronica.
meditations of the beast
i was looking into a window
at my own reflection
and suddenly
the smell of wax,
melting things,
and i saw your image
standing behind me,
Veronica.
The window cracked,
shattering
down to its lintel, reflected light
littering the ground,
and
i turned
and
saw you.
new monster
new monster
there is no revelation
besides remembrance.
there is no tide
aside from blood
and all about
in the sick dark
there is a pull--
as if new beasts
stretched their mouths,
there is a rhythm
to this rotted-sweet
lack of light.
raucous freshness
this is a story i have told myself already:
but a hand reached out
of that fiery, turgid depth.
it was a shaken and pale shoot
and it was mine.
i looked at it. it plunged into
the presence of you as if
into water.
as if
into
water,
distilled
and shattered
against
a pit
of glass:
smooth
and clear
as inverted
sunlight.
my love demands
what it can:
this
very heart
is yours.
save
me
from
my own
flesh.
dearest
thickset stalks of memory
fold against each other,
something improbable
slithering between
the upright sheaves.
i weave my image
with broken thread
and i weave with
sounds like
cold glass breaking
in heat. so that
it shimmers
so that
i need not
see
the thing
that waits
for the harvest
to show.
roses
push the sweet dank rot
out the red lips
coated like with lipstick
and we pushed
together.
fold, please--
re-pleat. please.
fold.
resonance
dear reader,
i am writing words
for the express purpose
of turning off
my mind.
my hands have
shaken other hands
and shaken by themselves:
the above exemplifies
description.
my hands have turned
like leaves falling from trees
into words in my own hands
and this is how
i have
and will
destroy
my own self
and not wait
for winter
white and cloudless
as raw pelting grains
of white rice
to do it for me.
the above
exemplifies
metaphor.
ich grolle nicht
strange
this search
for a word--
the word
of
looking
gilt
in its face,
or that
of fashioning
guilt
into some sort of
mirror.
i've cracked
in a space
delimned
by waiting
and shards
have fallen
to a pavement,
they refract
light, like
sun on lips,
and the light
shines up over
my face--
almost as if
i can feel
its glimmer,
the image
of
guilt
is my image
and my image
silvers
gilt's
visage.
veronica
veronica
but no one thought
and no one guessed
what the cloth caught
when it took his impress.
and no one heard
and no one saw
what the cloth learned
when it touched to his jaw.
my lord i begged
to be thrown away
but i received your dregs
and so i was saved.
my lord i cried
to be left unannealed
but away i was prized
and so i was pealed.
my lord, it was dark
in the place where i lay
until you lifted me up
into the light of your day
and blinded me to all but your way.
and bound me, bound me, bound me to your way.
zinc metaphor
(deep in the caverns
of my heart
there is a coin.
it has two faces
unchanging
and the metal
in the center
writhes
between them,
turned liquid
under pressure.)
turn away,
turn away life
and re-trap me
in the cypress' bark
and come aground,
the stopped heart,
come aground
and bear me
in your crucible
of unbreathing blood.
deep between
the walls of two visions
unfolds
a plane beyond time
weaving itself
of motion and desire:
spill me there,
white heart,
away from the bone depth
of your helpless drought--
spill me out apocryphate,
beyond sight,
splitting
with wetted sound,
at the least,
at the least,
self-enfolding.
i wept in a dream
"i want to put my mouth
to the comet's trail
and dye my hands
in fire," she said,
and i cannot do so without you.
and i cannot do so without you.
her insistence on my presence
is why i put my hands in hers,
though her skin chills
and her teeth glitter
with something
that looks like blood.
there are comets
in the early morning
for her to mouthe
and she brings me with her
and she plunges me into fire.
everywhere my skin touches, i feel you.
every place my blood beats, you are there.
at least you are there.
milton
crush
flesh
to dark
ness.
the tower
built
of raw dark
the up-
thrusting
thing
against
its ideal
turn it
real
taste
of yellow
roses
the stalklike
mark
on creamy
forearm
i was in the darkness, though.
but it was a meat darkness.
i pushed my way out
and there was meat for days.
quietus (in translation)
i see your face
as if transient, in a dream,
my first and last love--
the retching
stickiness
of memory
and the wrench
of distance
a hand that wishes to
hold nothing
yet
lets nothing go
a wretched
and circular
desire.
a wretched
and circular
desire.
i read your face
as if in memory
dearest
i read and rend your face
as if from memory.
a hand i once held
is over-full of memory
and my own hand
is over-full
of shadow--
substance.
i was robbed
of substance.
substance.
i was robbed
of substance.
fullness--i was
robbed
of fullness,
and hang,
sick,
like a crescent moon,
somewhere between day
and hungering night
while night
empties her budget
into her own
hollowness.
hollowness.
meditations of the beast
earth and sky
unbroken, tight
and unceasing as shackles--
air, light, dirt, everything,
unending, massed hostlike,
the press of hot things,
bodily and burned sacred.
break and writhe,
you, uncleanly thing,
and befoul heat itself
with your strangled release,
and you, dark receptacle
and you, dark receptacle
cleave to yourself
cleave yourself
and break yourself
and break yourself
for everything else
is too ready to spill you
if you dont spill yourself.
unbroken, tight
and unceasing as shackles--
air, light, dirt, everything,
unending, massed hostlike,
the press of hot things,
bodily and burned sacred.
break and writhe,
you, uncleanly thing,
and befoul heat itself
with your strangled release,
and you, dark receptacle
and you, dark receptacle
cleave to yourself
cleave yourself
and break yourself
and break yourself
for everything else
is too ready to spill you
if you dont spill yourself.
new monster
details, bleached and splitting, warping
as if in the sun of my thoughts--as if my mind
were a thing of light and not just pressure.
there is a time, it told me,
its words as crystalline, as incised against
each other
as cut
glass,
to drink the juice
from the vein.
but i was awake, sitting up
as if from a dream, as if from a bed
i had slept in
as if a seed in earth
and the whole time
i had been watching the light twist into shadow
as if there were anything in this world
beyond
the wild reach
of pressure.
as if in the sun of my thoughts--as if my mind
were a thing of light and not just pressure.
there is a time, it told me,
its words as crystalline, as incised against
each other
as cut
glass,
to drink the juice
from the vein.
but i was awake, sitting up
as if from a dream, as if from a bed
i had slept in
as if a seed in earth
and the whole time
i had been watching the light twist into shadow
as if there were anything in this world
beyond
the wild reach
of pressure.
raucous freshness
there is no logic without a god
to hold it against--i turned you into a prayer
because you were sweet to the roof of my mouth
and when i breathed in i breathed in your shadow,
because you rolled like an orange between teeth,
so frail, so flavorful.
but a god's logic is not our logic. the roll of you
against the dental crest, as if when i said your name
i touched you, or thought of you.
as if i could love you without mouthing more
than your name. i lay in a borges dream
soaked in blood, fist-deep in flowers,
breathing weary as a tiger
against the bars of an
interdental cage.
and the seed twisted
hyacinthine
between the jail of my ribs
fed on nothing but the blood of your name
and the flower of my breath.
to hold it against--i turned you into a prayer
because you were sweet to the roof of my mouth
and when i breathed in i breathed in your shadow,
because you rolled like an orange between teeth,
so frail, so flavorful.
but a god's logic is not our logic. the roll of you
against the dental crest, as if when i said your name
i touched you, or thought of you.
as if i could love you without mouthing more
than your name. i lay in a borges dream
soaked in blood, fist-deep in flowers,
breathing weary as a tiger
against the bars of an
interdental cage.
and the seed twisted
hyacinthine
between the jail of my ribs
fed on nothing but the blood of your name
and the flower of my breath.
dearest
these pathetic ways i hurt myself, still,
the eternal apprehension of death
an excuse to keep myself up all night.
i spend the hours admiring the city's private spill of stars,
immediate enough to tongue, the reflected street lights
in the rainslick on the pavement,
light
a nocturnal emission.
to care for oneself is
terrible, unsettling
as the bone-husband
of Persephone.
biting down on the seed,
juice
exploding
as if juice were light
from the microcosm
of the street, just as inept
as this body
at keeping
dry,
and as
inept
at rest.
the eternal apprehension of death
an excuse to keep myself up all night.
i spend the hours admiring the city's private spill of stars,
immediate enough to tongue, the reflected street lights
in the rainslick on the pavement,
light
a nocturnal emission.
to care for oneself is
terrible, unsettling
as the bone-husband
of Persephone.
biting down on the seed,
juice
exploding
as if juice were light
from the microcosm
of the street, just as inept
as this body
at keeping
dry,
and as
inept
at rest.
roses
in all honesty,
at this point,
i could ask myself what i am waiting
to acquire--
the beauty of an abstract
painting,
or a trifecta of die-cast
virtues--a suture
for some internal rip,
or something stranger: the discoloration of my eyes
as if they were a doll's eyes, my hand
the slender pale hand
of a waxen statue, the release
of an inner
inanimate
nature,
my nature...
as if, prayed for, i were a galatea, become
human
only to have time
stop about her
like a stiff garment.
i want to hold myself still as memory,
still as flesh can stay.
at this point,
i could ask myself what i am waiting
to acquire--
the beauty of an abstract
painting,
or a trifecta of die-cast
virtues--a suture
for some internal rip,
or something stranger: the discoloration of my eyes
as if they were a doll's eyes, my hand
the slender pale hand
of a waxen statue, the release
of an inner
inanimate
nature,
my nature...
as if, prayed for, i were a galatea, become
human
only to have time
stop about her
like a stiff garment.
i want to hold myself still as memory,
still as flesh can stay.
resonance
innumerable as a Seurat blue,
the points to life range
the span of time
like petals sinking into a pool.
your face is a mandala, therefore,
each moment of you
a grain i spilled on the floor.
time raised you up like a welt
and i slipped into its repentance.
time raised you up like a leaf
airborne without precedent.
your face is a mandala, therefore,
each moment of you
a grain i spilled on the floor.
the points to life range
the span of time
like petals sinking into a pool.
your face is a mandala, therefore,
each moment of you
a grain i spilled on the floor.
time raised you up like a welt
and i slipped into its repentance.
time raised you up like a leaf
airborne without precedent.
your face is a mandala, therefore,
each moment of you
a grain i spilled on the floor.
ich grolle nicht (sonnet-form)
awake again all night
and alone, time thick with shadows,
the t.v. going and the radio, maybe
i am finally distracted enough
to be able to say that, god,
i have known joy in pain but not like this,
every moment jewel-thick with its own worth
and each moment in hell.
(the t.v. going and the radio, maybe,
awake again all night,
and alone, time thick
every moment jewel-thick
and each moment in hell.
and each moment in hell.)
and alone, time thick with shadows,
the t.v. going and the radio, maybe
i am finally distracted enough
to be able to say that, god,
i have known joy in pain but not like this,
every moment jewel-thick with its own worth
and each moment in hell.
(the t.v. going and the radio, maybe,
awake again all night,
and alone, time thick
every moment jewel-thick
and each moment in hell.
and each moment in hell.)
veronica
still, taut
as a cat
waits.
they all thought
i would sleep
in a lily-white bed,
blankets clean
and crisp
as the stars overhead,
without memories
of stifling,
until i was done
breathing in
and out
scorn--
a sensitive nature,
i waited
until they were spent,
and now i take
my own.
you left me alone
like an easter egg
and
i had
bad dreams.
as a cat
waits.
they all thought
i would sleep
in a lily-white bed,
blankets clean
and crisp
as the stars overhead,
without memories
of stifling,
until i was done
breathing in
and out
scorn--
a sensitive nature,
i waited
until they were spent,
and now i take
my own.
you left me alone
like an easter egg
and
i had
bad dreams.
zinc metaphor
the dream is of
a landscape littered
solely
with its own length
and its own breadth:
a space, crumpled
between substance and
concept like
a sheet gripped
in clutching hands.
turned this way and that
i am a snow globe of positions.
the things i do not allow myself
are only the things i need
if i cannot cajole this one
pathetic miracle--
the rough pleating
of substance
and concept--
into the length and breadth
of my hands.
a landscape littered
solely
with its own length
and its own breadth:
a space, crumpled
between substance and
concept like
a sheet gripped
in clutching hands.
turned this way and that
i am a snow globe of positions.
the things i do not allow myself
are only the things i need
if i cannot cajole this one
pathetic miracle--
the rough pleating
of substance
and concept--
into the length and breadth
of my hands.
i wept in a dream
i wept in a dream, beloved.
i wept that you were there
and i wept that you were not there.
if you were there, i wept,
then,
that i was not there, or that
i was, o my lover, with
your eyes and mouth like
stars.
i wept that you were there
and i wept that you were not there.
if you were there, i wept,
then,
that i was not there, or that
i was, o my lover, with
your eyes and mouth like
stars.
milton
the thing is that
when incising
the flesh turns
on the point
of the knife and
not the other way around.
it was something
to center on.
now i have nothing
but happiness,
and that, terrifyingly,
is not
a dream.
when incising
the flesh turns
on the point
of the knife and
not the other way around.
it was something
to center on.
now i have nothing
but happiness,
and that, terrifyingly,
is not
a dream.
quietus
as if i were made
of particle-board,
screw happiness
into me,
o god.
i have
resisted
with my eyes
and hands
the touch
of it,
your most
refulgent
gift.
but it crept in
through my ears and mouth
and vibrates on
a crystal pitch--
your logic is not
my logic, god.
i am held
in the palm
of your hand,
blind,
and you make
me sing,
sing most
anything.
of particle-board,
screw happiness
into me,
o god.
i have
resisted
with my eyes
and hands
the touch
of it,
your most
refulgent
gift.
but it crept in
through my ears and mouth
and vibrates on
a crystal pitch--
your logic is not
my logic, god.
i am held
in the palm
of your hand,
blind,
and you make
me sing,
sing most
anything.
meditations of the beast
burrowing toward center
in the darkness,
the smell of jade-green forest
and sunset, the smell
even of a sun-warmed feather
a bird dropped
in exploding
cacophonous
from a treetop
the swirl of wings
the sky's metonym
and the choked stomach
of the earth
and the water flowed
like diamonds.
this was the blood in the vein.
i looked up
and i said your word.
in the darkness,
the smell of jade-green forest
and sunset, the smell
even of a sun-warmed feather
a bird dropped
in exploding
cacophonous
from a treetop
the swirl of wings
the sky's metonym
and the choked stomach
of the earth
and the water flowed
like diamonds.
this was the blood in the vein.
i looked up
and i said your word.
new monster
i called for you
and you didn't come.
it bears
repeating:
i called for you
and you didn't come.
impossible for this to be
a true betrayal,
girl with your red blood mouth
and your hair as dark as a memory.
when we owed each other
nothing
beyond my obsession.
ergo there must be some point stuck
still
deeper than this
and broken off
at the hilt,
lost
to its handle.
and you didn't come.
it bears
repeating:
i called for you
and you didn't come.
impossible for this to be
a true betrayal,
girl with your red blood mouth
and your hair as dark as a memory.
when we owed each other
nothing
beyond my obsession.
ergo there must be some point stuck
still
deeper than this
and broken off
at the hilt,
lost
to its handle.
raucous freshness
laura turned into a game for petrarch,
a chase through stone monuments
with green moss new-rhizomed on them
every year
every year he came back to her
and said something new on her face...
i feel wild tonight wild and cyclical
thinking of you
vanesa
of how i would think your name and
feel chasms open like windows in me
and light come up from them
from the molten core of me itself
the earth inside not red but like a sun.
and so my purpose
quite plain
vanesa
i do not re-rewrite your name
but live the legacy
you made in me
and write
what does not pass for poetry
a chase through stone monuments
with green moss new-rhizomed on them
every year
every year he came back to her
and said something new on her face...
i feel wild tonight wild and cyclical
thinking of you
vanesa
of how i would think your name and
feel chasms open like windows in me
and light come up from them
from the molten core of me itself
the earth inside not red but like a sun.
and so my purpose
quite plain
vanesa
i do not re-rewrite your name
but live the legacy
you made in me
and write
what does not pass for poetry
dearest
something about the way
the shell works,
the infinity of the shell,
the shell's rest,
lies split
on sand,
and what was within
goes shaking, slithering, dragging
itself
from moment to moment,
from tide to tide.
i looked inside--
forceless and infinite
i found the tide
i dug myself down--
hey down a down
past the shell to the bone
and in this deep night,
dearest, i claim you
vanesa
it was you i loved
vanesa
i name you.
the shell works,
the infinity of the shell,
the shell's rest,
lies split
on sand,
and what was within
goes shaking, slithering, dragging
itself
from moment to moment,
from tide to tide.
i looked inside--
forceless and infinite
i found the tide
i dug myself down--
hey down a down
past the shell to the bone
and in this deep night,
dearest, i claim you
vanesa
it was you i loved
vanesa
i name you.
roses
hurting for a framework of words
with which to house
this blank sacrament of feeling
the feeling of suture
of being threaded
together
along lines, irradiate
between white and black
a spectrum as hollow as whole.
the thing is that the white and black are not the same but they exist simultaneously in the same place. thus i am strung by what may loosely be termed a paradox. and the whole world seems to thrum along these strings which collect within themselves moment after moment, while i hang back in fear and in love, mourning what time has discarded, uselessly human. this is not a metaphor, it is a description, and hence a bulletin from the abyss. but i will drag myself out. and then time will pay for all it has broken.
with which to house
this blank sacrament of feeling
the feeling of suture
of being threaded
together
along lines, irradiate
between white and black
a spectrum as hollow as whole.
the thing is that the white and black are not the same but they exist simultaneously in the same place. thus i am strung by what may loosely be termed a paradox. and the whole world seems to thrum along these strings which collect within themselves moment after moment, while i hang back in fear and in love, mourning what time has discarded, uselessly human. this is not a metaphor, it is a description, and hence a bulletin from the abyss. but i will drag myself out. and then time will pay for all it has broken.
resonance
there is no answer in vengeance because vengeance is only the apparition of repetition.
this is why in the morning i would go and prune my climbing roses.
i would fork spade after spade of nutrient-rich ground
back over the roots, a morning ritual.
and then i would wind the cut stems around my wrists
and pretend i was capable of filling death
with something other than life,
like duty, or shame,
or the nutrient-rich corrosion
of an unacknowledged self...
but the roses were props
and the pretense was hollow.
now i philosophize
inside
and the rose grows
a tangle
over the wall of the house.
this is why in the morning i would go and prune my climbing roses.
i would fork spade after spade of nutrient-rich ground
back over the roots, a morning ritual.
and then i would wind the cut stems around my wrists
and pretend i was capable of filling death
with something other than life,
like duty, or shame,
or the nutrient-rich corrosion
of an unacknowledged self...
but the roses were props
and the pretense was hollow.
now i philosophize
inside
and the rose grows
a tangle
over the wall of the house.
ich grolle nicht
but if i never deserved to feel love the first time, why would i deserve to do anything like love again? wasn't the first time stolen, against all odds, against overwhelming evidence? something filched from time, put into place only
by virtue of
a fugitive
will?
there is a song
casting its thin thread
across Stygian waters:
vanesa, vanesa,
i drank
nothing
from the chalice
of your face.
by virtue of
a fugitive
will?
there is a song
casting its thin thread
across Stygian waters:
vanesa, vanesa,
i drank
nothing
from the chalice
of your face.
veronica
half-living here at
the flooding end of time,
a planed and constant fear
at the back of my mouth--
afloat,
clinging
to meaning,
meaning
in memory
as slender
as the
print
of a
foot
on pavement
in my mind, i suck your shadow from the stone.
i remake your foot from the taste of the ground.
in memory, i spiral down, down, down,
to the rock and to the bone.
the flooding end of time,
a planed and constant fear
at the back of my mouth--
afloat,
clinging
to meaning,
meaning
in memory
as slender
as the
of a
foot
on pavement
in my mind, i suck your shadow from the stone.
i remake your foot from the taste of the ground.
in memory, i spiral down, down, down,
to the rock and to the bone.
zinc metaphor
charon says:
she was not
even
halfway there
monseigneur
she saw
the water-road
unfold
before
her dark eyes
heard
the spent ones'
cries
she jumped
into the waves
and said let me
swim for shore
she had paid in
full
monseigneur
so i did not
stop her
i do not know
if she is still
swimming
she was not
even
halfway there
monseigneur
she saw
the water-road
unfold
before
her dark eyes
heard
the spent ones'
cries
she jumped
into the waves
and said let me
swim for shore
she had paid in
full
monseigneur
so i did not
stop her
i do not know
if she is still
swimming
i wept in a dream
petrarch chased laura over the woods-road, feet trapping on roots grown into the way, sunlight filtered to green and umber above and the road itself below of old and swollen flagstone, the moss gathering between stone-breaks flowering in flakes of white. the air in his mouth tasted sweeter than other air. he heard her laugh as he pushed back curtains of hanging lichens and found himself at the abbey. she was leaning against the stones of the ruined gate, in red, smiling, her long black hair in a thick knot at the nape of her neck and as he walked up to her she disappeared naturally.
but he knew what to do: dropped to his knees because it had happened this way countless times and licked the pavement where she had stood. swallowed. and the sounds of her loveliness came in strands from his throat. he gathered them and bound them around his wrists. and he couched back on his heels and imagined satyrs and clerics come to him and mark the moment, bless his devotion as a beautiful process...
but in his mind there was a tree being smothered by its own shadow. and when he woke with moonlight stretched across his face, he stood and looked out into the hot night and knew
that with or without her he still was dreaming
and the moonlight stretched like a hand over venice.
but he knew what to do: dropped to his knees because it had happened this way countless times and licked the pavement where she had stood. swallowed. and the sounds of her loveliness came in strands from his throat. he gathered them and bound them around his wrists. and he couched back on his heels and imagined satyrs and clerics come to him and mark the moment, bless his devotion as a beautiful process...
but in his mind there was a tree being smothered by its own shadow. and when he woke with moonlight stretched across his face, he stood and looked out into the hot night and knew
that with or without her he still was dreaming
and the moonlight stretched like a hand over venice.
milton
it was just a dream, the tower built from the thick smoke of offerings.
because there was nothing to offer and nothing to burn.
the cavern roof rose clean as it had ever been.
now i offer my fear to you o god.
i put it on the altar of this frame of me,
the flesh and bony bits and the neural semaphore.
the flag of flame unrolls--i will live in smoke
but no matter.
to you vanesa who asked nothing
i leave the act of burning.
because there was nothing to offer and nothing to burn.
the cavern roof rose clean as it had ever been.
now i offer my fear to you o god.
i put it on the altar of this frame of me,
the flesh and bony bits and the neural semaphore.
the flag of flame unrolls--i will live in smoke
but no matter.
to you vanesa who asked nothing
i leave the act of burning.
quietus
my hair looks in the mirror like a thatched roof
when will my hair stop looking like a thatched roof?
lover when you come to me
lover when you come to me.
my eyes are in the mirror like two coals
when will my eyes be less like two coals?
lover when you come to me
lover when you come to me.
my cheek is blank in the mirror like an unlined sheet
when will my cheek not be an unlined sheet?
lover when you come to me
lover when you come to me.
my brow is in the mirror like a coin
when will my brow be spent like a coin?
lover when you come to me
lover when you come to me.
my mouth is in the mirror like a tight-tied bow
when will my mouth be bought and sold?
lover when you come to me
lover when you come to me.
when will my hair stop looking like a thatched roof?
lover when you come to me
lover when you come to me.
my eyes are in the mirror like two coals
when will my eyes be less like two coals?
lover when you come to me
lover when you come to me.
my cheek is blank in the mirror like an unlined sheet
when will my cheek not be an unlined sheet?
lover when you come to me
lover when you come to me.
my brow is in the mirror like a coin
when will my brow be spent like a coin?
lover when you come to me
lover when you come to me.
my mouth is in the mirror like a tight-tied bow
when will my mouth be bought and sold?
lover when you come to me
lover when you come to me.
meditations of the beast
blank:
vanesa i have writ your name in every word
and thereby writ nothing--syllables, phonemes
all washing clear against each other like ice
melting in the glass.
a clear pane
through which to see writ your name
full:
vanesa every word
draws toward you
every word is made
your word
a clear pane
through which to see your name
vanesa i have writ your name in every word
and thereby writ nothing--syllables, phonemes
all washing clear against each other like ice
melting in the glass.
a clear pane
through which to see writ your name
full:
vanesa every word
draws toward you
every word is made
your word
a clear pane
through which to see your name
new monster
sick and feeble and
slinking
away from all i had known
i looked back at time and
wondered
i wondered where
the beginning had
gone
and
i wondered why
everything always
was new-
begun.
my bones felt
like matchsticks
under a blazing sun.
i curled myself upon
rock
as if
i could truly
shade
the ground.
the only
left
thing
was the bone
and the blood--
the rest i
shed
like a breath
the rest i
shed
like a breath
the rest i
shed
like a breath
slinking
away from all i had known
i looked back at time and
wondered
i wondered where
the beginning had
gone
and
i wondered why
everything always
was new-
begun.
my bones felt
like matchsticks
under a blazing sun.
i curled myself upon
rock
as if
i could truly
shade
the ground.
the only
left
thing
was the bone
and the blood--
the rest i
shed
like a breath
the rest i
shed
like a breath
the rest i
shed
like a breath
raucous freshness
i have handled worse than these,
you say to yourself, and say it freely--
the beauty of a saw
scraping the wood away
from itself,
as if your words
are a heel
scraped
on concrete--
the words would be
truer yet if you
had the breath
left
to say them.
you say to yourself, and say it freely--
the beauty of a saw
scraping the wood away
from itself,
as if your words
are a heel
scraped
on concrete--
the words would be
truer yet if you
had the breath
left
to say them.
dearest
and was it so
bad?
when you ended
up
with such smooth
fingers, your
mind
a merry
oyster
and glistening
within,
the pearl?
tell me, you, have i
never expressed my
gratitude?
through teeth chipping
and yellow like
old paint
have i
really never
really never
when the night has come
and the land is dark
and the moon is the only light we'll see
no i won't be afraid
no i won't shed a tear
just as long as you
stand by me
stand by me
bad?
when you ended
up
with such smooth
fingers, your
mind
a merry
oyster
and glistening
within,
the pearl?
tell me, you, have i
never expressed my
gratitude?
through teeth chipping
and yellow like
old paint
have i
really never
really never
when the night has come
and the land is dark
and the moon is the only light we'll see
no i won't be afraid
no i won't shed a tear
just as long as you
stand by me
stand by me
roses
meditations of the beast:
i stare into your fire, red rose,
your heart like lips and your lips like blood,
your blood on fire.
against the ground
it runs
gathering
dry things
to itself--
determine the blaze, rose.
taste the meaning
of the blaze.
taste my meaning,
take it in your petals
and know
until the end of time
how you loved the smear of it,
red rose,
your heart
dry and chapped
as a
thirsty
mouth.
i stare into your fire, red rose,
your heart like lips and your lips like blood,
your blood on fire.
against the ground
it runs
gathering
dry things
to itself--
determine the blaze, rose.
taste the meaning
of the blaze.
taste my meaning,
take it in your petals
and know
until the end of time
how you loved the smear of it,
red rose,
your heart
dry and chapped
as a
thirsty
mouth.
resonance
i will never be spent
in composing your elegy,
your elegy of red.
if i were to embroider your face
i would embroider in red silks,
on cloth dyed red.
i would dye the cloth myself
with a long hair brush of my hair,
with handprints of red,
with red i had made myself,
and when i had finished sewing you
i would undo
every
last
stitch
in composing your elegy,
your elegy of red.
if i were to embroider your face
i would embroider in red silks,
on cloth dyed red.
i would dye the cloth myself
with a long hair brush of my hair,
with handprints of red,
with red i had made myself,
and when i had finished sewing you
i would undo
every
last
stitch
ich grolle nicht
the issues are complexified
by facts i cannot go into right now.
but for an instance:
that labyrinth borges harps on about.
where what's mirrored is wilder
than the image it projects.
and at the same time every double
is as real as that which it has doubled.
because according to some other beautiful culture
there are ways
to get behind
the image
and see the image
behind the image.
my thoughts pathless,
writhing
like a tangle
of black
harp strings.
by facts i cannot go into right now.
but for an instance:
that labyrinth borges harps on about.
where what's mirrored is wilder
than the image it projects.
and at the same time every double
is as real as that which it has doubled.
because according to some other beautiful culture
there are ways
to get behind
the image
and see the image
behind the image.
my thoughts pathless,
writhing
like a tangle
of black
harp strings.
veronica
i held you closer
and closer
until
nothing
but cloth
divided us
i invited you in
i let you turn me
like a season
i turned you like
a season i turned you
sharpness to shadow
pleasure on pleasure.
as if we were yellow
as roses, i invited you in,
i let you turn me
like a season.
from spring to summer
i turned you forward.
a poppy bloomed
in the dooryard
of your bed.
from spring to winter
you turned me; you held
my face
against the time
and you turned me.
and closer
until
nothing
but cloth
divided us
i invited you in
i let you turn me
like a season
i turned you like
a season i turned you
sharpness to shadow
pleasure on pleasure.
as if we were yellow
as roses, i invited you in,
i let you turn me
like a season.
from spring to summer
i turned you forward.
a poppy bloomed
in the dooryard
of your bed.
from spring to winter
you turned me; you held
my face
against the time
and you turned me.
zinc metaphor
love
love is
love is tied
tied up
up in
tied up in pain
like
like fat
like fat ties
ties up
up the
ties up the vein.
love is
love is tied
tied up
up in
tied up in pain
like
like fat
like fat ties
ties up
up the
ties up the vein.
i wept in a dream
but i don't know what i saw.
i lay ont the ground with geryon
watching the wickedest arrow
dive into
st. sebastian, the patron saint
of love
and we felt for resonance we felt for it together
but instead
i reached inside
and pulled
and pulled
and pulled and
(as if one barb
could be turned
into a full bloom)
i saw blood
eventually.
i lay ont the ground with geryon
watching the wickedest arrow
dive into
st. sebastian, the patron saint
of love
and we felt for resonance we felt for it together
but instead
i reached inside
and pulled
and pulled
and pulled and
(as if one barb
could be turned
into a full bloom)
i saw blood
eventually.
milton
geryon lay on the ground.
above and beyond him, around
the tower and the column of his breath
grew roses tangled
like hair
dragged through earth.
the roses had their own pulses
against the gray and blue sky.
they marbled geryon's sight
and he thought that if
he could just dive into pain
once again
as if into clean water
wash the moment
of his being
clean
of itself
wash himself clean
of himself
but expurgation was
an impossibility
so geryon looked
to the ribboned
rose-rimmed sky
as if to a knife.
but it was not a knife
and nothing
was safe
above and beyond him, around
the tower and the column of his breath
grew roses tangled
like hair
dragged through earth.
the roses had their own pulses
against the gray and blue sky.
they marbled geryon's sight
and he thought that if
he could just dive into pain
once again
as if into clean water
wash the moment
of his being
clean
of itself
wash himself clean
of himself
but expurgation was
an impossibility
so geryon looked
to the ribboned
rose-rimmed sky
as if to a knife.
but it was not a knife
and nothing
was safe
quietus
geryon was a monster. everything about him was red.
i was within a cosmic self-friendship,
something casual.
but the blue world
turned me into a battlefield.
i saw red-running hands
their red turning to silver
in water and the water
turning red.
the moon trailed a path
against the lake
and there was nothing left
to view through the window
nothing left
so the glass shattered.
when i thrust
a fist
against it.
i was within a cosmic self-friendship,
something casual.
but the blue world
turned me into a battlefield.
i saw red-running hands
their red turning to silver
in water and the water
turning red.
the moon trailed a path
against the lake
and there was nothing left
to view through the window
nothing left
so the glass shattered.
when i thrust
a fist
against it.
meditations of the beast
meditations of the beast:
carve time and space
out of what is available
and leave
what can only somewhat be
behind
to strip the ground
and grow,
its waxen leaves
reflecting moonlight
and when broken
loosing
finest
sap
are there many little boys who think that they
are a monster? but in my case
for better or for worse i am right.
carve time and space
out of what is available
and leave
what can only somewhat be
behind
to strip the ground
and grow,
its waxen leaves
reflecting moonlight
and when broken
loosing
finest
sap
are there many little boys who think that they
are a monster? but in my case
for better or for worse i am right.
new monster
dive into
high gold
as if it were
water.
searching the
caverns
of my body
for you
silence
waiting
veronicate
it might be enough,
i think,
to wait--
i learn it from
the empty parts--
from the spaces,
where the gold
settled
where the gold
flows
thickly,
thick
enough.
high gold
as if it were
water.
searching the
caverns
of my body
for you
silence
waiting
veronicate
it might be enough,
i think,
to wait--
i learn it from
the empty parts--
from the spaces,
where the gold
settled
where the gold
flows
thickly,
thick
enough.
raucous freshness
the gold was time
or longing
the gold was the root
of my tongue
all tastes at its base.
i was untethered
but i didn't notice.
sky had stretched, scratching at itself like trees' leaves,
over the lintel of the door like
a smear of blue paint.
i had been still in a corner
amidst dead leaves,
covered in them,
like a bad dog
with my back to the door
as its hinges
moved.
or longing
the gold was the root
of my tongue
all tastes at its base.
i was untethered
but i didn't notice.
sky had stretched, scratching at itself like trees' leaves,
over the lintel of the door like
a smear of blue paint.
i had been still in a corner
amidst dead leaves,
covered in them,
like a bad dog
with my back to the door
as its hinges
moved.
dearest
something
i had dug
through
for
down past
what had seemed
impenetrable
through
solid
or what had seemed solid.
i dug two holes through it
and wore it
like a mask
i had dug
through
to see you.
the gold was
veronicate:
something i filled
something i
pressed
pressed my face
into
i had dug
through
for
down past
what had seemed
impenetrable
through
solid
or what had seemed solid.
i dug two holes through it
and wore it
like a mask
i had dug
through
to see you.
the gold was
veronicate:
something i filled
something i
pressed
pressed my face
into
roses
the moment before the shot, the hunter
seeing
sunset light
ripple across the doe's back,
splash, break gentle
and drip down
to pool in the leaves
to soak down into dirt.
everything fluid.
even the barks of the trees
fluid with shadow.
seeing
sunset light
ripple across the doe's back,
splash, break gentle
and drip down
to pool in the leaves
to soak down into dirt.
everything fluid.
even the barks of the trees
fluid with shadow.
resonance
no point in swallowing
i let it roll
from the corners of my lips
overfull and
unfed...
the buck with
its golden horns
its nostril rimmed
with gold
as if it were
a statue,
so still.
the scent of pine
almost blue
in the nose
i was not choking.
i was not choking.
i was not falling
into the pool,
the water so clean
spotlessly clean
because everything
in it
turned to gold
and drifted
to the bottom.
i do not dare you now
because there is nothing to dare,
i am so still
i was not alone
because god lifted me
in his golden palm.
i let it roll
from the corners of my lips
overfull and
unfed...
the buck with
its golden horns
its nostril rimmed
with gold
as if it were
a statue,
so still.
the scent of pine
almost blue
in the nose
i was not choking.
i was not choking.
i was not falling
into the pool,
the water so clean
spotlessly clean
because everything
in it
turned to gold
and drifted
to the bottom.
i do not dare you now
because there is nothing to dare,
i am so still
i was not alone
because god lifted me
in his golden palm.
ich grolle nicht
you thrust deep
into the heart
of each cell
of my blood
a gold coin
so that i am flushed
and heavy
with your
worth
into the heart
of each cell
of my blood
a gold coin
so that i am flushed
and heavy
with your
worth
zinc metaphor
open split
open
split
open like
a shell
like a shell
with its cream
center so
smooth
i will bury the lightless
inside-bone cavity but i will be told the truth
i will mouthe your image and spit it out like bone
i will crown your brow with brown hide
i will cowl your visage with a broken membrane in my mind
i will do such things
i know not yet what they are
zinc metaphor:
too heavy for plumbing
open
split
open like
a shell
like a shell
with its cream
center so
smooth
i will bury the lightless
inside-bone cavity but i will be told the truth
i will mouthe your image and spit it out like bone
i will crown your brow with brown hide
i will cowl your visage with a broken membrane in my mind
i will do such things
i know not yet what they are
zinc metaphor:
too heavy for plumbing
i wept in a dream
a day of love and war i spent wrapped in a dream, weeping, constant weeping, for you, with your skin like a map and your arteries and veins all opening and closing like the mouths of hungry birdlings.
you kept me a seedling, pounding the ground down over my head with the flat of a shovel. in the fall you would cut the wood for the winter and then spiders would get into it. i was a girl in a fairy tale, in a tower, but i became the haunting. haunting myself i crossed lintels and sills. i left scratches on the panes but they showed only when the glass was fogged.
i am in danger now so i have to leave. just keep in mind how much i wept for you. and stop punishing me, because the asparagus was as thin as a rail and it was too expensive anyway. it's all nonsense anyway. there was some blood on the windowsill, just an old stain, and the words in the glass read
i love you too much to let you go
but it was nonsense, as much nonsense as breath.
and the asparagus got all salty-red-wet.
you kept me a seedling, pounding the ground down over my head with the flat of a shovel. in the fall you would cut the wood for the winter and then spiders would get into it. i was a girl in a fairy tale, in a tower, but i became the haunting. haunting myself i crossed lintels and sills. i left scratches on the panes but they showed only when the glass was fogged.
i am in danger now so i have to leave. just keep in mind how much i wept for you. and stop punishing me, because the asparagus was as thin as a rail and it was too expensive anyway. it's all nonsense anyway. there was some blood on the windowsill, just an old stain, and the words in the glass read
i love you too much to let you go
but it was nonsense, as much nonsense as breath.
and the asparagus got all salty-red-wet.
milton
it was a warm spring day when you locked the door on the tower. when you closed down the windows. you put your finger up and up as if you were trying to unlatch something but instead it closed everything.
and i thought to myself, i am not that person, scratching and raging against that lock like a hoyden. i was outside the window like peter pan, watching the action; i watched that sick little simulacrum in the room enact her beastly tiny passions.
because you punished, she was punishable. so she must be guilty.
something about her must be guilty.
something about her
must
be guilty.
and i thought to myself, i am not that person, scratching and raging against that lock like a hoyden. i was outside the window like peter pan, watching the action; i watched that sick little simulacrum in the room enact her beastly tiny passions.
because you punished, she was punishable. so she must be guilty.
something about her must be guilty.
something about her
must
be guilty.
quietus
when i arrange my love as if a smear
of yellow-gold encrustment on a wound,
infected like an unattended tear--
upholstering skin--the letting of the blood--
when i abide my love but bare, a place
cavernous empty, echoing, empty, caverns--
when i regard my love within my face
its undiluted strength a weft that ravens--
when i address my love, when i address
my love with terms of love, when i belove
my love with terms a dove would creel to press
bare from its beak, when i my love behoove
when i behave with love as if addressed--
when i think any paucit word is clearer
than those i shed, but cannot break the mirror.
of yellow-gold encrustment on a wound,
infected like an unattended tear--
upholstering skin--the letting of the blood--
when i abide my love but bare, a place
cavernous empty, echoing, empty, caverns--
when i regard my love within my face
its undiluted strength a weft that ravens--
when i address my love, when i address
my love with terms of love, when i belove
my love with terms a dove would creel to press
bare from its beak, when i my love behoove
when i behave with love as if addressed--
when i think any paucit word is clearer
than those i shed, but cannot break the mirror.
meditations of the beast
i cleaved down
to the vein of gold
and out spilled
dawn colors
pink as faint
as water in a white bowl
with just three drops
of blood in it
purple-blue like a pulse
under the wrist-skin
but these were just
imaginary, licensed by
a mind not at rest.
the gold ran true, though,
true as my heart.
to the vein of gold
and out spilled
dawn colors
pink as faint
as water in a white bowl
with just three drops
of blood in it
purple-blue like a pulse
under the wrist-skin
but these were just
imaginary, licensed by
a mind not at rest.
the gold ran true, though,
true as my heart.
new monster
you left me
like something flown
the cage
my ribs like
an empty cove
i was your altar
now i am
any shelf
you were my owner
but
now that you are gone
the hand on the leash
is fear's.
my tongue out
to catch
any wayward
gust of you
left
in this
white
emptiness.
like something flown
the cage
my ribs like
an empty cove
i was your altar
now i am
any shelf
you were my owner
but
now that you are gone
the hand on the leash
is fear's.
my tongue out
to catch
any wayward
gust of you
left
in this
white
emptiness.
raucous freshness
time draws the line. addiction through time--i never knew, but time draws it, the line.
i thought i was addicted to drink. i was not addicted to drink. i find that now, when i go for weeks without a drop of drink. nothing in me wants it with white-hot wanting.
and i thought i was addicted to smoking. i am not addicted to smoking. it is sometimes a wistful longing, a pang, the desire for smoking, but nothing like heart-deep, nothing like.
i was addicted to the cut.
and i am still addicted to the cut.
everything in me
unfurled down
that line
made in my skin, everything
pooled
in the shade of that upwelling.
even now i turn to stone
thinking of it, thinking
of loosing
feeling
in its
diasporate freshness,
its rapt white strength
of endurance in creation
and its blind red
result.
i thought i was addicted to drink. i was not addicted to drink. i find that now, when i go for weeks without a drop of drink. nothing in me wants it with white-hot wanting.
and i thought i was addicted to smoking. i am not addicted to smoking. it is sometimes a wistful longing, a pang, the desire for smoking, but nothing like heart-deep, nothing like.
i was addicted to the cut.
and i am still addicted to the cut.
everything in me
unfurled down
that line
made in my skin, everything
pooled
in the shade of that upwelling.
even now i turn to stone
thinking of it, thinking
of loosing
feeling
in its
diasporate freshness,
its rapt white strength
of endurance in creation
and its blind red
result.
dearest
you realize that you're just going to have to do it all over again:
it began with a thought.
there was a cloudburst; there were sieves; there was a screaming thing.
there was the ever-present smell of eucalyptus.
and i thought, i dig my hands into the dirt and i dig up an explosion and
for what? and for what?
and for what did i give
you up?
it began with a thought.
there was a cloudburst; there were sieves; there was a screaming thing.
there was the ever-present smell of eucalyptus.
and i thought, i dig my hands into the dirt and i dig up an explosion and
for what? and for what?
and for what did i give
you up?
roses
o magnum mysterium:
trapped by the literality
of a dumbass metaphor, i
ride
the backroads
of lafayette.
the world is velvet and blue
and the road is as if a feeling--
the road is as if a feeling--
and the curve of the wheel is a thought mirrored
in the action of the car.
the moon is a slice of white glass
counterdistinct to the point it might draw blood
the stars are white and the sky is black
the time is autumn
the flavor of the air is autumnal
autumn days have lovely thick light
and blue shadows, and autumn nights
are shadow piled upon shadow.
o rose in your pale mystery
your lustrous freshness leeched from you perhaps
yet not not ever the pale twilight colors of your drying
and the smell like raisins
o rose in your pale state
you wait for your lover to take you yet
trapped by the literality
of a dumbass metaphor, i
ride
the backroads
of lafayette.
the world is velvet and blue
and the road is as if a feeling--
the road is as if a feeling--
and the curve of the wheel is a thought mirrored
in the action of the car.
the moon is a slice of white glass
counterdistinct to the point it might draw blood
the stars are white and the sky is black
the time is autumn
the flavor of the air is autumnal
autumn days have lovely thick light
and blue shadows, and autumn nights
are shadow piled upon shadow.
o rose in your pale mystery
your lustrous freshness leeched from you perhaps
yet not not ever the pale twilight colors of your drying
and the smell like raisins
o rose in your pale state
you wait for your lover to take you yet
resonance
you await yet
one drop of sanity to salvage itself
from this thing--the smoking wreck
of your sense of safety
and you await it alone because you have learned
to be your own hero
from a disney movie
and you are not good with words
and you are afraid.
but there is no connective thread
in your hand. because flesh
was supposed to be your guard
but it betrayed you.
the connection isn't in your reach--
you watch it writhe somewhere down deep
like a live wire, sending out
such sparks
and you just
hurt yourself.
one drop of sanity to salvage itself
from this thing--the smoking wreck
of your sense of safety
and you await it alone because you have learned
to be your own hero
from a disney movie
and you are not good with words
and you are afraid.
but there is no connective thread
in your hand. because flesh
was supposed to be your guard
but it betrayed you.
the connection isn't in your reach--
you watch it writhe somewhere down deep
like a live wire, sending out
such sparks
and you just
hurt yourself.
ich grolle nicht
because
i don't know
what goes here:
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0111 1
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1
1
1
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1
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i don't know
what goes here:
1 01
11 01
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0111 1
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0001 11
0011 10
0111 00
1110 00
111 00? 111? 11111? 11111111?11111111???11? 1?
1
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veronica
masquerade / paper faces on parade / masquerade / hide your face so the world will never find you
there is a sweater on the floor that my mom knitted of expensive yarn
i will have to take it apart and reknit it because i cannot wear white anymore.
just smile for me and let the day begin /
you are the sunshine that lights my heart within
my love, i bury my face
in your empty shirt.
i drench the cuffs of my shirt
in the spray from my heart.
why is it secret? / what have we to hide?
fingers like icicles
on the inner thigh.
there is a sweater on the floor that my mom knitted of expensive yarn
i will have to take it apart and reknit it because i cannot wear white anymore.
just smile for me and let the day begin /
you are the sunshine that lights my heart within
my love, i bury my face
in your empty shirt.
i drench the cuffs of my shirt
in the spray from my heart.
why is it secret? / what have we to hide?
fingers like icicles
on the inner thigh.
zinc metaphor
i watched you slip by as if a river i looked into
had taken hold of my reflection
and run off with it.
the nitingale bled her note above me
and below were those pomegranates
staining the water.
i was a white thing, hurt's own.
stretched out across the sky like nuit,
light pricked from me.
the real secret of it was
that all my loves became one.
force,
and the vine-covered wall with
the mounded rosemary above it,
wreathed in fog, lit by
the orange street lamp.
force,
and the smoke of the cigarette,
its burn stubbing at my finger-ends,
over-sharp in the throat.
force, and you too
vanesa.
your dark hair i wished
to twine about my wrists--i must have wished
to feel your hair against my throat.
but my arms were lined
only with dry dull wine color
and the zinc-whiteness
of the scar.
everything
conflated
to the point
of nothing
like white teeth
running through a fruit
until nothing is left
no, not even the seed.
even you--
i imagined even you
devoured
by that seared dead whiteness.
which is why i never wanted.
which is why i only loved.
had taken hold of my reflection
and run off with it.
the nitingale bled her note above me
and below were those pomegranates
staining the water.
i was a white thing, hurt's own.
stretched out across the sky like nuit,
light pricked from me.
the real secret of it was
that all my loves became one.
force,
and the vine-covered wall with
the mounded rosemary above it,
wreathed in fog, lit by
the orange street lamp.
force,
and the smoke of the cigarette,
its burn stubbing at my finger-ends,
over-sharp in the throat.
force, and you too
vanesa.
your dark hair i wished
to twine about my wrists--i must have wished
to feel your hair against my throat.
but my arms were lined
only with dry dull wine color
and the zinc-whiteness
of the scar.
everything
conflated
to the point
of nothing
like white teeth
running through a fruit
until nothing is left
no, not even the seed.
even you--
i imagined even you
devoured
by that seared dead whiteness.
which is why i never wanted.
which is why i only loved.
i wept in a dream
i wept in a dream, beloved.
i wept that you were not there or that you were
i wept into the stones your steps had touched
i wept into the hearts of the flowers your eyes had touched.
i wept in a dream, beloved.
teeth like stones, a broken line of jaw and throat
swallowing monumental words and
words' heat, the friction of
the tongue, lips, and teeth.
i wept in a dream that i was not near you.
when i was near you, i wept that i was near you.
i wept at the taste of your shadow in my mouth.
when i awoke, i was still weeping red tears inside the vein.
i wept that you were not there or that you were
i wept into the stones your steps had touched
i wept into the hearts of the flowers your eyes had touched.
i wept in a dream, beloved.
teeth like stones, a broken line of jaw and throat
swallowing monumental words and
words' heat, the friction of
the tongue, lips, and teeth.
i wept in a dream that i was not near you.
when i was near you, i wept that i was near you.
i wept at the taste of your shadow in my mouth.
when i awoke, i was still weeping red tears inside the vein.
milton
and so my blood is powered by you.
it churns against itself for you, running miles and miles
in a taut circle, a claustrophobic dream of red--
you were there, though what i felt was a dream
you were a dream, but what i felt was real.
and so turn, turn, turn, turn, turn, my everything-maker;
up and down run run run run
the stairs to the tower are taut and cold
and the sky is gray as gray velvet
and inside something is striking at the wall
love or force
force in love
up and down the blood runs like
a rodent in a mill
a river cutting across a green landscape
there is a deer stopping to drink in the purple shade
of a poplar, its lines as clean as the running water
my pulse is just your drum
lover
my pulse is just your drum
it churns against itself for you, running miles and miles
in a taut circle, a claustrophobic dream of red--
you were there, though what i felt was a dream
you were a dream, but what i felt was real.
and so turn, turn, turn, turn, turn, my everything-maker;
up and down run run run run
the stairs to the tower are taut and cold
and the sky is gray as gray velvet
and inside something is striking at the wall
love or force
force in love
up and down the blood runs like
a rodent in a mill
a river cutting across a green landscape
there is a deer stopping to drink in the purple shade
of a poplar, its lines as clean as the running water
my pulse is just your drum
lover
my pulse is just your drum
quietus
love is the great good use
one person makes of another
indiscriminate
writing
ripping
things from out
the skin
and merchandising
them
i am
the tool
of sadness
the tool
of labor
i am
a lead weight
i am
colored like
an oyster
with the same
impassable lips
until
any fool rips
me open and
makes me his whore
(little polly
little polly
of the strawberry letter)
one person makes of another
indiscriminate
writing
ripping
things from out
the skin
and merchandising
them
i am
the tool
of sadness
the tool
of labor
i am
a lead weight
i am
colored like
an oyster
with the same
impassable lips
until
any fool rips
me open and
makes me his whore
(little polly
little polly
of the strawberry letter)
meditations of the beast
pouring out everything into a dust-rich air
as if i poured out liquor onto a grave,
in memory of a face.
i spend my life in mourning,
pouring out everything in mourning,
because no other path is forming.
i feel, therefore must feel something.
but love having destroyed me
initially
somehow nullifies
its saving capacity.
and so i am nothing,
nothing that love will give me.
i am the queen of hell.
i am a blank smile.
souls scamper by
in misery and i am still
smiling.
as if i poured out liquor onto a grave,
in memory of a face.
i spend my life in mourning,
pouring out everything in mourning,
because no other path is forming.
i feel, therefore must feel something.
but love having destroyed me
initially
somehow nullifies
its saving capacity.
and so i am nothing,
nothing that love will give me.
i am the queen of hell.
i am a blank smile.
souls scamper by
in misery and i am still
smiling.
new monster
the conferrence of all blame onto myself is an act
of
rage
self-loathing does not make me weak
just
limited
horizons a bloody mess--
the world a cage--
each sunset a butchered side
yet each shining vermilion and
strips of marbled white, the eye of bone
like the sun
i may close my eyes to breathe
but i am nobody's bitch
but my own
of
rage
self-loathing does not make me weak
just
limited
horizons a bloody mess--
the world a cage--
each sunset a butchered side
yet each shining vermilion and
strips of marbled white, the eye of bone
like the sun
i may close my eyes to breathe
but i am nobody's bitch
but my own
raucous freshness
for e.e. cummings
she was so fresh so ridiculously fresh i could smell her when she just walked into the room
so i took her for a spin
it was like spring rolled right off her after a bitter january and i could see what i wanted was it so wrong
to take her out on the road
she was so new
she was so fresh
so new and fresh and tender
and ready to ride in
they don't always know when they are ready
but i could tell.
she was so fresh so ridiculously fresh i could smell her when she just walked into the room
so i took her for a spin
it was like spring rolled right off her after a bitter january and i could see what i wanted was it so wrong
to take her out on the road
she was so new
she was so fresh
so new and fresh and tender
and ready to ride in
they don't always know when they are ready
but i could tell.
dearest
there was something off
about the turn of my feelings for you.
as if you were the knife
i used to slice myself a door
walk into my heart and
carve carve carve.
deep in the hearth of me,
there was a reckoning made
between stone and fire.
i did not wish to hurt
the image of you, not even
with the tiniest breath
of heat...nor to betray
the stone of myself
with anything like hope.
then i was angry at myself
for loving you, until
my stone heart cracked and
the fire poured out.
deep in the cavern of me
is a coin,
flashing gold--the currency of you,
yes,
but also
something concrete
you left behind--
vanesa, i am filled
because you left me your worth.
about the turn of my feelings for you.
as if you were the knife
i used to slice myself a door
walk into my heart and
carve carve carve.
deep in the hearth of me,
there was a reckoning made
between stone and fire.
i did not wish to hurt
the image of you, not even
with the tiniest breath
of heat...nor to betray
the stone of myself
with anything like hope.
then i was angry at myself
for loving you, until
my stone heart cracked and
the fire poured out.
deep in the cavern of me
is a coin,
flashing gold--the currency of you,
yes,
but also
something concrete
you left behind--
vanesa, i am filled
because you left me your worth.
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