—for Harryette Mullen and John Wieners
heirloom hairline sugar
lips what’s up gas lit
you’re holding the match
dirty mattress book rhythms
deep cuts deep coot swamp
diver give it suture “get right
with Godzilla” because she
wants giblets and goblins
ghost of my femur such
a fever holding on tight
to these lashes lachrymose
lust if you must
I’m moving like
bootstrappin’ molasses back
in machine time churning
out administrative eros
using my future
growing it like a pearl
or buffalo a rumor
a deer a seer urchin
sibyl salt water
messenger getting
to bottom of soaked
the sea is renewal
the DNA stew is cruel
one allele two allele
to half sashay
pockets full of neuroses
Cassius Cassius
we’re in butterfly time
vibrating all the way
back to the moon womb
It’s sad hour at the messiah’s
strip club tender vitals
chicken wiring a solution
to our escape problem.
THIRTEEN THINGS I DO EVERY DAY
Open the back door for the felines to sniff
the morning breeze
feed them from the dishes
of immortality
analyze my father’s heart (from a distance)
make and drink elixir made of good earth
and warmth from my favorite star
be relieved the fault did not break big overnight
sniff the morning breeze
ponder when Kate will wake
kiss Kate goodbye
marvel at myriad of birds (black crowned night heron,
snowy egret, diving brown pelicans etc.) gathered at
tidal lagoon
keep an eye out for the bat ray
bewitch academic bureaucracy
from country to cuntry
be on the lookout for blood
anywhere
pretend I’m a crow
FOUR SONNETS
—for Ted Berrigan
1. dear Ted, hello. It is 5:15 a.m.
These horses are all up in my
hippocampus (in a canter), or
could it be another sea
monster feeding on deep
brain limbic loop juice:
Judas Iscariot spilling salt
into a black hole swallowing
the story of its birth,
ours too because we
are wherever light is
(or isn’t) even if only
eight minutes and
twenty seconds away.
hippocampus (in a canter), or
could it be another sea
monster feeding on deep
brain limbic loop juice:
Judas Iscariot spilling salt
into a black hole swallowing
the story of its birth,
ours too because we
are wherever light is
(or isn’t) even if only
eight minutes and
twenty seconds away.
2. dear Ted, hello. It is 6:00 a.m.
I’m reading about an antimatter
experiment in the world’s largest
particle accelerator, oh, they said
the anti-hydrogen atoms drifted
down like maple leaves
in October. And how beautiful
I thought they annihilate so
harmlessly in the detectors.
I count gratitudes with
coffee. No rockets fell on
me or loved ones while we
slept. Everyone’s bins got
emptied this morning.
experiment in the world’s largest
particle accelerator, oh, they said
the anti-hydrogen atoms drifted
down like maple leaves
in October. And how beautiful
I thought they annihilate so
harmlessly in the detectors.
I count gratitudes with
coffee. No rockets fell on
me or loved ones while we
slept. Everyone’s bins got
emptied this morning.
3. dear ted hello today I
learned about the language
of internal vibration I can no
longer do child’s pose and
not think of children under
colossal debris of their
homes mosques hospitals if
one pays for bread with
one’s life who eats
the word origin circulates
my nervous system
flares base pairs native
soils exile bleed out
exhale into the sea.
of internal vibration I can no
longer do child’s pose and
not think of children under
colossal debris of their
homes mosques hospitals if
one pays for bread with
one’s life who eats
the word origin circulates
my nervous system
flares base pairs native
soils exile bleed out
exhale into the sea.
4. dear Ted, hello, I don’t know the time,
only that it’s a rainy December
Wednesday, and the fig and persimmon
trees next door delight me. Leaves
leave fruits behind. Unlike the figs
pouring over our fence, we will
never reach those orange hallelujahs.
Unless we ask, but we won’t.
What does it mean to have one’s
familial history tied to trees? For
example, groves of ancient
olives. To see them ripped from
the earth before one’s eyes—I do
not know how to end this.
Wednesday, and the fig and persimmon
trees next door delight me. Leaves
leave fruits behind. Unlike the figs
pouring over our fence, we will
never reach those orange hallelujahs.
Unless we ask, but we won’t.
What does it mean to have one’s
familial history tied to trees? For
example, groves of ancient
olives. To see them ripped from
the earth before one’s eyes—I do
not know how to end this.