Away, a heartbeat


Shooing away proximity
cat near the bird feeder
babe near the street

Perceiving a path of exclusion
Immortal assumptions
extemporized voluntaries

The frozen annunciation
oiled onto the
mute canvas

As we lean into the wall
with the archangel’s bone
china teacup

And strain to catch
the muscle song of
the involuntary






Owl Dream


I know how to get there
the place between here
and there

You lured me with an endless
strand of pearls in your beak

and I recklessly followed your winged didacticism
through a harlequin of overlapping spider webs,
between night skies laced with silent screech
around ancient pillars of discontent
and into a blinding indigo moon,
where we dined on crunchy shrews
and velvet voles,
pelleted the earth with our satisfaction

and stared with tiger eyes
through each other
into another darker
damper
dream






Requiem for the Loss of Sense


I. Pillow

without which
they didn’t . . .

II. Tantrum

a consequence of
no headrest

III. Silver

how it would have been
if

IV. Roof

the rain song
sadly

V. Vacant

as if we didn’t know about it
the emptiness

VI. Atlas

too late to do any good
no matter what you carried in life

VII. Break

In which
the heart perished