In Front Of The Art Museum

Last night

I dreamt you were peddling books

In front of the art museum

Used books — although —

In my estimation
A book

Generous with nuances between its covers

Can never be referred to

As being used

A book
Is not a woman used, used up

Courteous behind your makeshift stall

Suave towards the curious passersby

Negotiating

Artbooks, poetry, 

Psychology no longer in vogue,

Things to rid.

You had acquired new spectacles

Gold rimmed and stylish

To outfit your new outlook

Your new views

And you said to me: look, I am flying!

You flew onto the terracotta rooftops

Vaulting from crest to crest

Agile like a panther

My feet were rooted on the pavement

I was taking you in, every inch of you

You were

On top of the world

Too adroit to ever fall

So you thought

GARDEN, MINE

I garden my remembrances

My roses are speared with thorns

My arms bruised,

My arms welcoming and soft.

 

A crescent cove, that crease where

Your smile breaks,

A wave unfolding tranquil to shore.

 

As I plant a bulb or mulch a thirsty root

The long-ago casual glances—

No, that’s not true, write true.

 

Furtive is true, with longing, a sadness, regret

All those are true, never casual, never ordinary.

 

Always I searched for it

In the topography of your face

 

To go back or reach forward

See you smile into crescent-moonlight cove

Linger for the softest kiss

Its unfolding into sand and silk and your breath

So close.

 

To hear the sibilant calm wave

Temper the dissonance of time

 

If this plausible, this wish if granted,

What enchanted flowers grow here.

 

THE SACRIFICIAL

The goat was injured.

A winsome, all white

Or all black, smooth fur.

A head injury

A small swollen spot

Covering the sanguine rush

She died.

We got ready to bury her

Some bones were shattered

Not ours

Cuddling into it, her death, 

Soon she passed out of memory

It's more peaceful this way,

The goat telephoned to say.

Synthesis

Hard

Under earth chambers

Stairs and carved stone

The sphinx waited — each morsel of soil brushed

Despite the unbearable heat, hot heat

Descending surface seek

Even river water is boiling: desire heat 

Lips lips, melt, want,

That heat

However

The powerless sphinx with chiselled face 

and in awe

We kist in the sleeping room

I am resting my bones

Said the general, a real general, commander of

A lot

I don’t give a fuck

Vibrated the voice of infinity

Your names

Your silk and gold upon mattresses

The titles of a crowning halo

All fineries all spoils: bishops and queen,  

Checkmate (it always ends in checkmate).

The only rules that apply are mine

Plus permanent suffering.

Everyone’s are gonna get brittle eventually

Deossification? Diagenesis? Dust?

I love the energy

Inconsequential
Subatomic
Infinitesimal

Dusting particles in my backyard

The weaklings think fear

The strong need weaker game

Electrifying

          It

          Has

          Been

          This

          Way

          And will continue to be.

          What change? 

          What change?

         

          Never change

          This is the way I love you

          It

          Has

          Been

          This

          Way

          And will continue to be.

          What change? 

          What change?

         Never a change

         That's the way to Olympus

The tumulus curves like a wedding cake with a lion on top

Who swallowed the bride and groom

These things happen no need to be innocent about it why are you crying

Little girl old girl why are you crying

Below as beyond

Turbulence and chaos and a black hole

The buried virgins tall and amply carved turned into marble

The matriarch was mortal after all

The general’s family was bludgeoned to death

The horse was cremated but its spirit lives on

The baby died: Megalocephaly

It was a beauty to behold 

For the noble and courageous grand style

I’ll remember you, promised infinity

I'll make sure you get a workout 

Particle by particle 

By particle by particle by parti—

Parts in synthesis, you do you understand me?

It will be magnetic but without purpose

Purpose

Exists where gravity

Twisted
The shape of infinity while moving through static 

                               

            There is no limit to infinite love 

            Never

            Boundaries to boundless patience

            There is no limit to infinite love

            That’s such a lovely song, sing it again!

            There is no limit to infinite love 

            Never

            Boundaries to boundless patience

            There is no limit to infinite love

In Memory Of Robert Thompson

1: Night

One by one 

Lights flicker and snuff out

The city is shutting down

A street organ is playing

Spinning the music of long ago

Songs of desire and loss

Songs of betrayal

Wine-soaked singing

Molasses the sounds

Drifting in the jasmine scented night

2:  A Dream

Come to me shadow and starlight

Come for one unmeasured moment

I want

Flesh to flesh

Interlaced

Your stubbled salt cheek

 3:  Salonika

They were two  

And holding hands

Before, I had known them as one and one

The girl's hair yellow like ripened lemons

Fell in sharp angles around her face

Her man laughed a confident laugh

He enjoyed laughter

I understood
Too late Too close to twilight

After the ravages took hold

I took stock

We wandered leisurely on the promenade

Heading westward toward the tower

It was a prison once

Its captives, who were they?

Bruised souls with forgotten names

Their screaming silenced now

and ashes, ashes

returning southward to a home lost

ashes moving through space

dispersing over the beloved hills

over the familiar sea

she carried her numbers, bright blue

4: Time

We sailed into the small hours

The two-masted caique was brightly lit

Its crew calling for passengers

He was first on the gangplank

And it was a floating bar we walked into

No particular time chuckled the waitress

We close when we run out of customers

Heineken with a light misting of seawater 
He said

This drink has a pleasing taste,
Produced by hugging

Hugging?

The gunwale with one hand

A mug of beer with the other

We swung by our table for refills    

As the boat rocked

As the breeze picked up

Our careless chatter

The broken clock

We are sailing still

STEEL BLUE

Mid-March returned with

Grey pearl sky of elsewhere

Summer

Familiar the opaque murky essence

Parceled into rectangles

Each pane the same melancholy hue

A solitary hawk

Frequent companion

Of my cloistered awakenings

Circled the oak

Lenses mapping

The barren view

The raptor decides:

A glide, a swerve

A clutch mangles

There is no camouflage for game

Beneath my bedclothes

Chill

Till dreams kindle remembrance

I gazed off the starboard bow

Amid the steel blue of depth and height

My vision burning umber

Again

The memory of an impermeable clasp

Again

Unmeasured brightness, unmeasured sorrow

The chaste huntress and the luscious cunt

Slay them

As I am spinning, spinning 

Spinning stained umber

I fall off into the roundness of the earth 

a poem without verse

each wave at a standstill

petals lightly curved

an abundance of petals

blooming fruit

a poem without verse

glimmering,

evening glimmering

           

            dream of the vigorous delights

yield to the memory –

dewdrop,

how it nearly brushed across your lips

a fragrant sigh,

it was ephemeral

the pleasure, the caress

            of roses, of love 

Plenty Of Stone

Stark and therefore more beautiful 
So beautiful that it calls out

Its striking plainness

The lack of verdant lushness

Low grasses and weeds

Clusters of thorned shrubbery

Sweetened dust and pungent myrrh

Soil is at a premium here

From shapeless rock

An amphitheatre was chiselled

To glorify important lawmakers perhaps

Or to appease a thunderous oracle

Such a long time ago it was

The rain owns it now

Veils of time cover it

Snow and wind and sunlight

Orators, spectators, their substance altered

Who were they?  But they were, once

As you and I were once

You called out to me 

I could have touched your heart 
But for the stone

DIRTY LAUNDRY

“He’s dead,” she said.

“Yes, he died of cancer;

I heard about it.

Did you know him?”

“I knew of him, mostly.”       

He was not her sort

Therefore she tried to recall

All she could

This was intrigue to her

Three at the kitchen table 

In the cupboard across

The cherished wedding china displayed

Green scrollwork on white background

This visitor next to me

Had an air of elegance

But which elegance?

Trait or pretence?

She continued:

“Once in a while

I’d run into him at a coffee shop.”

 “What did you think of him?”

She narrowed her eyelids,

Thought,

Answered:

“He was somewhat of a rascal.

I considered him a reprobate —

He cursed a lot, tough guy slang.”

“I don’t remember 

Cursing or slang,” I said.

“How could you remember? 

 You were so young!”

This from our hostess

As she poured coffee into porcelain cups

Green scrollwork on white background

“He had a mistress,

She was young,  

He bought her a car

They say he paid her rent, also.”

Our hostess poured cream offered sugar

“Sounds as though he kept her,” she said.

An old friend

She guessed why my curiosity

“What did his wife think?”

I asked.

“Nothing to think. She put up with it.”

“What happened to the girls?”

I always worried about those

Two daughters of his

Worried for their safety

They took the entrance exams

The son of a bitch

Wanted them to attend

My school

Did he still carry a knife?

I didn’t ask

I was happy to hear

What the visitor said

Even with limited information

I felt avenged 

It showed, his nature

He was a

Slick

Crafty

Knave

It’s been almost half a century

Have I lived that long?

When I think of

Those late afternoons

During childhood

His presence hovering 

My state of confusion 

Hands smothering panic

I start to believe

I’ve lived long enough

Hang it up, hang it up

Filthy shard of an old

China cup

Spectral memories

Coil in the background

Hang it up they hiss

The three of us had coffee

Hot, strong

Late June

Late afternoon

The cool Sunday breeze

Inviting after

Saturday’s wedding

And we guests tired

From the night before

I live in the margins of life 

Those nightmares

What did I survive them for?

Safely Hidden

The act of living

The reliving

Softly an ending 

A mournful sonata

Time paused

Broken strings

This one snapped during practice

This one? 

I can’t remember why this string died

I hold on 
To broken things

Safe in its hiding place

My white embroidered cardigan

A gift once best-loved

Now out of vogue

Its pockets 
Filled with broken violin strings

february poem

I

from my window

snow

spreading steadily ahead

a soft plunge on water 

unfrozen crystal blossoms

my cloak made of snow

the finest stark-white plaid

buried with snow

warmth is

overtop bullies masque as seekers

they reeducate 

their reeducated

I’m thirsty

these sermonizing automatons

II

winter has played me out

each week lasting a decade

a whisper

made me happy

and I leaned back into it

branches

their silence

a faith for spring

for bleeding hearts to carve the floor

rising in bloom

III

when I disrobe

into the flame

blaze visible

your beach

take

our first swim

imperfect

which was perfection

a genesis for

IV

sugar maple

rock maple maple tree

the orange red in fall

I embraced

your pulse over me

maple syrup moonbeams

sugar maple syrup — mine

sunblade