11.
Unrequited Sonnets #1-4
(in solidarity with Michael)
Sonnet # 1
If spirits materialize from simple air,
If body is only mud and inspiration,
If mind is chemicals and little wires
Then soul is only sun's radiation.
If we are here together in this place
Defined as revolutions in infinity,
The swirls of spheres, the distance space,
Then time is no more than insanity.
If I can feel your breath against my skin,
And know the depth inside your open eyes,
If you can understand these things, well then,
You'll know I'm no more than they signify.
If thoughts are real, as some suppose they are,
Then you have all you need because I care.
Sonnet #2
The morning brings blue light across the lawn,
Begins to fill the emptiness of night
With insect song and bird, the noise of dawn,
The razor blaze of heat, a first white light.
The day proceeds in
old routines we all repeat,
The work, the effort to provide, survive.
We sweat beneath the sky, we rest and eat.
In struggles life's a constant take and give.
The evening cools the brow, the wilting flower;
Brings a welcome calm, revives the heart.
It stays no longer than the briefest hour
before the colors dim and then are dark.
Such days are dreams we live, then sleep.
But this, a memory, is yours to keep.
Sonnet #3
Don’t want to press my ear against your chest
And listen to your beating heart. Don’t want
To watch you breathe, to feel your pulse or rest
My wrists against your neck. No. No, I don’t.
Don’t want to hold you tight. Not to be held.
Don’t need your eyes’ subtle blue mystery.
My ears can’t hear, my lips can’t kiss or tell.
We have no future, present, no history.
Don’t have a thought of you when I’m alone.
Don’t watch you walk across my memories,
Or ache to call your name, to use the phone,
To talk to you, to share my passion. Please.
I tell the world these lies in self defense.
I’m guilty though I plead my innocence.
Sonnet # 4
The old song goes – "across a crowded room"
And silly as it seems I know it’s true.
A look and suddenly the heart’s consumed
In fire, the arrow glance – the target you.
A spark of recognition through the haze,
Time slows and words become a droning blur.
The skin glows hot, imagined music plays,
The floor turns soft; the thoughts my pulses stir.
A dance begins like drift wood rocking toward
The shore. I find myself advancing near.
The motion of the waves won’t be ignored –
An undertow, a blink, you disappear.
Still in my mind I see you as at first.
I fall in love again, and so am cursed.
14.
I’d Rather Not Say
I told you that.
I said I’d been swallowing razorblades
all weekend.
You might think my neck would leak.
You might imagine seeing me spit nails.
The moon blisters my face.
I’m that sensitive to the light.
How many times have I tried to tell you.
I know what Ram Bam thinks of women.
Should women teach scripture?
What is the color of your vagina?
Maybe you should keep that to yourself.
There are bullet holes
that get used as glory holes,
and holes that let the sunlight in.
Sometimes I feel like a man.
I don’t know how anyone can live like that.
The sun makes monochrome bows
in the distant clouds.
That’s dust in the air.
We need to find a shade
and get out of our shadows.
Next thing you know
we’ll be boiling ink.
The Impression
She said she did all of this just to impress you.
The last thing she did looked like piss stains.
It’s still early but it’s still too hot to care.
The car, the vulture and a sad cop wait for her.
15 .
June, don’t you hear the neighbors whispering?
They’re building a wall with their electric saws.
"The sounds of the stars give me a heartache," she wept.
Which stars she didn’t mention, but we suspect daytime TV.
"If you were truly impressed you’d tell your friends,’
she complained, "but by that time it’ll be the dead of winter."
June, they’re having an exorcism in the front yard
and all the devil wants is to be let up
so he can have a cigarette.
Instructions
rack my ribs
tell me fibs
pull my leg
make me beg
dig my need
watch me bleed
feel my weak
heat my seek
shake my head
break my bed
play me dead
say I said
lick my lead
paint me red
16.
Letters
I want to write letters
telling you how much I enjoyed
watching you sleep.
17.
Book
Took the book apart and put it back together.
It may not look like a work of art
but it reads a lot better.
We find ourselves walking into a mist
that feels just like death.
Eugene came back from the jungle
with a new drug
and the vision of a shaman.
Is this why she has changed her name?
How many naked men
can dance
on the end of a pin?
O, June, teach me the song
every dog knows.
I’ll read your book
till every word glows.
Young Poet
Close enough to smell your verse
and I love the stink of it. Your rhymes flash like flesh, spread like breath.
I suck them up into my lungs.
I try to avoid looking at your face,
try to avoid the desire to kiss – I must taste the scum on your tongue.