flutter
You beg me to sing so loud,
pray that I will open my mouth wide,
the deep and dark bell of a shining cornet,
until seas of rippled butterflies barrel forth,
millions of burning leadlight wings propelled
to migrate 3000 miles across statelines,
to drink upon your milky weeds,
to float upon thermals in pink skies,
to shelter in the mighty boughs of Oyamel,
Abies religiosa - sacred, sacred.
What we’ve held in our hands is sacred, you say,
but my neon caterpillar died in it’s cocoon
the moment yours nestled inside hers
and fell asleep.
Remember - you searched but couldn’t find it,
nicotined fingertips brushing against
deadened herbs, the color bled from their stalks.
Transformation slides into place
like a nock along a bowstring -
the sharp glistening of januaries,
the sweet, rich butter of full moons,
the petaled commas of roses,
the eight loops of fishing line,
all eaten by enzymes starved and seated
at your grandmother’s tiled table,
a chemical reaction leaving only
a Babylonian tower of dishes
piled high in the kitchen sink.
My mouth, too changed -
no longer a portal,
no longer for kissing,
for whispering,
for feeding,
for singing.
for loving,
only a midnight cave with no end,
no treasure,
no magic.
snowflakes
Frost forms near to us -
on a blade of grass, a window pane.
Shocks of frozen feathers secure,
bound to the fixed planes
of our mornings and nights,
anchored by the promise
of metamorphosing molecules.
The housechores of a warm cottage
shrouded in thick thatches of dawn-glint
softly bake away bonds, sliding now -
sliding, sliding, breaking -
two shattered vintage cordials,
a new year’s toast transformed
to sharp and shining rubble,
mined from the walls of a cave
by the beak of a bluebird.
No, we took shape in the sky -
a faraway star birthed in darkness,
an old filament quietly sparking to light
from the center of a ceramic Christmas bulb
in the attic of your father’s house.
We branched like oaks,
six spokes, a child’s bicycle
six petals, your favorite blossom,
six needles, a broken compass.
We formed in rippled heavens,
In upper atmospheres,
In plane highways and drunken moonlight,
In the pews of some astral church
where the winds sing
from the pages of hymnals
so timeworn they’re sheets of water,
Where satellites orbit
like a wet finger on a wine glass,
so loud, so crystalline - can you hear it?
Can you hear what I mean?
My voice is a bell -
struck with the force of the meteors
that shower above us,
sprawling in arcs
like boughs of willow,
like Washington square parks,
like burning red sandstone,
like fireworks in summer.
We formed in layers of clouds,
stitched like rows of knit baby blankets,
tiered like the sugary fondant of wedding cakes.
Like the long-johns and sweaters and coats
and mittens and scarves and hats
your mother dressed you in,
like the rough skin of your hands
that holds the pitched ink naming our love.
Like the rings of your favorite climbing tree,
like your grandmother’s lasagna,
like the heart of the earth,
like roses,
like ocean,
like cardiac muscle -
like everything striated
with the depth of the living.
Four and a half billion years ago,
eight years ago, this morning,
a celestial lineage born of a single moment:
our cells kiss snowflakes from thin air,
then we move through each ribbon of open sky
floating, sinking, spinning, waltzing -
falling.
To karly on her thirty second birthday
First, a sea of tuna
trapped in a current
on the parkway
Foggy metal boxes
and mirrors glinting like gills
Then, the briny sweetness
the air dressed in salt
the roar-hum
of an ancient tide
a sun drenched shanty
Later, combing for riches
the gull-cry peal
of your laughter
You twirl and skip
among the seaweeds
I will keep you like a pearl
until there is no moon left
Terrace Place
There we’re waiting,
inky shallows.
There we’re searching
skies for firecracker light.
Where I’m shoeless,
cold feet, white-whisked.
Where you’re shirtless -
glossy underbelly of a pike.
Shaking snails out
of your pockets.
Shaking rain-chilled
lashes dark with mud and mire.
Are we digging
mollusked-heartache?
Are we holding
onto fragile friends forever?
My hands combing
sand for skip-stones.
Your hands dripping,
picking for me white nymphaea.
Found it shining
in the water.
Found it dancing,
the stars haloed around our heads.
Parker Street
It was Spring - no, Winter.
I think someone said it was afternoon.
It was late morning and
the clouds were slow but high and gray
on Huntington and
You ran to me,
You gathered me in your arms
like a child. You spun me in circles.
Around and around - the years went by.
The sun was blinding.
Were the leaves falling? It was nighttime and
I’d never seen you smile so wide.
2578
I would swim my body skyways
Tangled up in foamy white lace
Sidestroke, backstroke, breaststroke
Just to paint with you
I would drink up soft lakewater
Even swing your tiny daughter
Round and round in circles
Just to live with you
I would let you crack me open
Shiny mussel, light and floating
I still wear the pearls your
Mother gave to you
July forever, clear skies forever
Just you and I, before the war -
Would you sing to me alone again
in summer, at my blue front door?
neuburg, 2019
A riverside whaler
Cries two if by sea
Though I am trapped alone
Between liberty and water
A beautiful turret
Is no strong match for
A siege of ships
Beneath the cover of nightfall
A soundless seasickness
Washes over me
A whalebone caught
Between my mouth and lungs
A harpoon pierces
All that is beautiful
I float away
Beneath the waves
All I am is gone from me
A sunken wharf or
A whale without a song
Faraway, this river leads to open ocean
Faraway, my rendered oil burns as candlelight
untitled
In a small white room
At the top of the stairs
There is a view of a river.
The strength of her current is deceptive,
for she merely drifts in the direction
the curving landscape suggests.
She bends her will,
concedes to the earth’s twists and turns.
She is water without wetness.
She is a brain without a body.
She cries in waves as boats
carve along her surface.
She has no voice.