No grandstanding but subtle as a dream.

One flake on the rooftop,

another feathering the gutter.

A brief decoration on the window,

right from Christmas tree to glass.

A measured beginning like the opening

notes of a symphony, so low, so soft,

only trained ears can hear.

The house must first be spoon-fed

before it goes all over white.

Your eyes open slowly, expecting light,

greeted by gray wool sky, frosty coat to sills,

fluttering slivers of some great upper-atmosphere

concoction reforming as fence-shapes, garden

memories, fleets of plows, laughing children.

Your body in its sheer pink nightgown

rolls over into my emerging arms.

“It snowed,” you whisper. My eyes break slowly

free of sleep. Forget snow. You’re all I see.

You’re all that happened overnight.

That slim crevice in my thumb where I bit

the cuticle off has blossomed

into a miniature ruby.

Bow-stretched the bony flesh of my knee

has grown distraught,

snapped into two. But ultimately

was bully enough to turn

my lower leg into a slouching sloth bear

ever in search of a termite hill.

My lungs, spongy with phlegm now bounce

like a water bed in its cage of bones.

Barnacled, every single one of them.

There are stings from insects I

had no idea even existed. These

are running loose on my skin.

There are others as well - transparent spots

and darts, suspended in coloured air,

and no one is any the wiser. No one else  

knows  about the sudden creatures

that neither bite nor bruise.

Their job is to dent my mind.

tangled fabric hills

rising and falling

with days of the week

the landscape i can see from our bed

is never the same for long

you undress as you walk to the bed

every night

i sit on a tower of pillows

peel items from me

one by one

this ritual leaves our world-clothes

wrinkled in the morning

may i never look done

may i watch your body

emerging in half light before we sleep

clumsily shedding the day

in cotton and denim

without pause or hesitation coming to join me

this, every night, for as long as you’ll have me

Insomniac/hypochondriac/accident-prone/chain-smoking/suicidal/

depressive-alcoholic/lecherous-womaniser/ gangly-inept/I leapt/

the Twin Cities Guide to immortality/having just finished my second

suicide note for that year/that fecund ditch/ that water under a troubled bridge/

think of a man dropping like a lost shoe/a foot uncertain in its own wake/

I break hung-over and heart-broken/ a cigarette half-smoked/don’t forget

the wave/the poetry half-spoken/the development encroaching/the wide plain

sloping to the west/the steel-neck of the crane on the downtown skyline/the railroad

blackened from age/like Henry’s face/the smoke stacks belching thin white streams/

in my dreams I am singing/songs that never hit the ground/the waist-high

guard-rail/the discharged psychiatric patient/there was no water/there

was only pavement/a highway running underneath/nothing to break my fall

The month you left me,

I became bloodless,

a ghost, lying

in a tub that runs dark.

I float with wrists

that shiver

at the edge, drunk

in trembles— strange

I haven’t died yet.

Black eyed

Susan’s blink, into leaves

of water that shed

pink hibiscus petals

from folded femurs.

My shape holds me

while I stew

in a bone brine.

I’m no longer

the nude poised

at the edge,

of a white porcelain tub.

I’m naked, a black moor

with melanoid scales

that peel and float,

in a fishbowl of dead Koi.

My hands hang-

lily pads on the surface.

I wash dirty thoughts away;

listen to the echo

underneath-

a ghost of a womb

that beats

soft and shallow.

My day begins

with a slow drowning,

and I’m too terrified to crawl out.

And bread by the woodstove

waiting to be punched down again.

I step out into the dark

morning, find the last white flowers

in a Mason jar by the door

and a note from a friend saying

he would call again later. I go back

into the kitchen, tomatoes

on the windowsill after rain,

small things but vast

if you desire them.

The deep fresh red.

This life rushing towards me.

clear red thoughts.

giggle backwards giggle. 

in the black room,

a gathering that weaves tales

of what never happened describes

memories of dreams never described.

in the window, a reflection.

she holds a candle

and wheezes,

barely audible to me.

in a red glass, a reflection of a figure

moistening its lips, sniffs at

a faint odor of frankincense and myrrh

gently streaming through each

doorway.

she stands shakily in the hot breeze

planting her black boots

with 6 inch heels firmly into the ground

she can’t move. 

she can’t sit.

the thing rises again as her skin gently ripples 

with bumps and bruises.

creatures under the flesh

tell her secrets about the others

that watch the scenery as it passes under her image.

those 2 dimensions

that softly whimper,

then grow silent.

the other species at the

end of the room read

yellowed newspapers that

speak of ancient practices

before the bombs fell.

most specifically they start to talk

of non-specifics.

i grabbed her hands while she looked at the clocks

she burned sigils into my palms

then turned towards the empty television

as meat hooks bent and dropped it to the floor.

she spoke about a progressive disease or a function,

or a changing identity deeply transmitted,

while she pants for breath

in anticipation of symptoms for merciless medicine.

the beautiful and the sexy are

transmitted from the extinct generation with

some pain and some improvement through a variety of cases,

a substance in the air for

a hot weekend to play the sick role.

Many diseases and religions grant exceptions.

(pumped with pain)

“something different, wasn’t it?”

her head.

her eyes.

“it felt so good.”

I remember 

the very first time

I saw myself 

in your dark eyes wide

dark like mine

tears like mine 

bruises like mine.

Like me you took it 

all and gave nothing 

but your tears, like me 

you went to that quiet place 

behind your eyes as his arm 

rose and fell rose and fell. 

Flesh of my flesh, sister, 

bone of my bone. One.

On that dusty road

outside Baghdad

my thigh holster

made my walk all big

just like the guys

in the movies we’d watch

together. Together.

You were there with me

as I drew down on him

took my breath and squeezed

I saw the bullet cleave

that haji’s head. Cleave.

Wide open. A word I rolled

on the tongue. One we learned

together. Sunday school. Cleave.

Wide open. And I felt

your trigger finger on mine.

I swear I felt your dark eyes

behind mine and Sister I swear 

I never felt so alive  

My son has Autistic Disorder.

It’s only disorderly-

if you don’t have it.

I was happy

he was born

during a time

when people seemed

considerate, more

comfortable, and less

likely to point or laugh.

When I was a child,

we called the slow kids retards,

sang ‘We Are the Champions’,

when they went by.

The disabled girl who assists

in the deli was shaving black

forest ham. I was inside

having one of those moments,

where everything’s right,

in focus; like when you’re driving

and hear a song on the radio,

and everything feels better,

for three whole minutes.

I felt satisfied, content, anchored

to society. Then some woman

behind me said:

I don’t know why—

they hire people like this.

We should just gently

push them all

off a cliff.

The tea and oranges
are not from China,
they are from the
local shop.

The bread when
shared between us

is communion.