urban farmhouse at twilight
there is the subtlest of breezes from full-flung windows where the world
comes in, dragging its day-end noises: settling birds, slowing traffic.
It smells still of dark coffee & morning-baked bread. someone
coughs. the last sighs of light reflect against glass and chrome;
shadows pool between the cobbles. a scrape of chairs as this place
slowly empties, we the dregs of what had been an over-full cup.
my wine is sweeter with every
swallow.
fluorescent heartbeat,
a new green pulses lamplit;
last lip-stained-glass kiss.
shut door when done
remember when it was more than this.
remember the hiss of snow on the lake,
the feel of fire in its place.
remember the forgetting.
remember what truth was, its high-flung pain.
remember the next night.
remember the taste of never,
the perfection of a kiss in the sun.
remember the last time you felt safe.
remember that you are more than (t)his.
remember the dregs and the puddles.
remember these words: concave, blue, gravel, catatonic.
remember the walk barefoot, cobbled in rain.
remember the screams.
remember the hand that picked you back up.
remember why.
remember how it ended, and where it began.
remember that which it is needful to remember,
the song you never meant to hear.
remember that dreams, too, are sometimes prophetic.
capture no.1
un-
straight,
(like a)
tin-can shot
at
fleet-fragileimpossibleunheralded
happiness,
both wide-eyed barrels
staring down
wanderlusted glances
through smoke-crusted tomorrownights in
some back-bay bar where
the
backup guitarist
looks a little like you
and i’m a little
in love
with possibilities, running too
many yellows
before the needle
goes to zero.
Relativity
Academic vigours
lose their science
when it comes to art.
An array of space-point-time
lines foretelling
the devil’s future
in tingled palms,
they predict
useless fiscal gymnastics
in a landscape devoid
of tumbling mats. And
the earth? Upstream
folly commanding clocks
to run backward. We’re
left iceboxing in a desert
on the centennial eve of never-had-
existed. Avenue upon
avenue of comatose
dreamers, smiling at
the sun. I burn, therefore I am.
