“
Chatting to the gossip of flames
waking from the slumber of
our flesh-drunk night together—
it’s only when I step out
to pee do I notice—
how far, burgundy-dark,
the moon has risen….
On four paws the shepherd-
dogs bound, lightly
though the trees they
hardly touch on earth—
we saw it from far
sunk here
in an always-ache….
Dyeing paling twilight woods—
a pair of wasps, spiraling, writhe….
Wetted lips of hers
and mine, just-parted,
move over each other
with tongues just-coming
but refuse—
like mists of evening
they've no place to settle….
Just-here though she's singing
she’s in some song from long ago—
poised on the brink
of twilight longing
three thousand miles
rush through my heart….
Under undulating curtains—
I hover above her
the tips of me brushing
the tips of her—
breathing back and forth
a column of air
we share our breath
slowly asphyxiating….
From burning wood campfire sparks dart off
extinguishing in the wet blue dark…
how you blow your long wind
across my embers,
through my soul, she pleads me,
take away the pain—
I dip a branch in blue water
and plunge it into coals….
***
In pre-dawn dark, against
a leaping inferno of flames
black monolith of wood
in the cast iron compartment
softens, and—gradually— fractures
to cells, warping upward,
until from the top a shard splinters:
pearls of flame string a fiber
and leap in little tongues
while the log, glowing, engulfed,
is consumed by the inferno contained….
A shadow daunts me, haunts and taunts me
now reaching far, now recoiling, now growing bold….
I once sang eruptions and the wind—
then appeared you
it took my whole life
singing only the songs of you
and still I sing for you
what other refuge
can stay me from this torment?
So— my doppelganger has arrived
no one said it would happen this way
but the way his hands
fold like mine, the style
of his humor, broadness of his smile—
even the way he walks….
Licking and lapping these lashings
of grasses are in tongues at my feet
smoldering's the fury within me—
I have seen my fields of daylight warp
to noxious-air infernos
but still to the clean blue of the flame
I take rest in her breast….
His songs I mouth, and in my head
is his voice— I cannot hear my own….
in my mind I see myself— thin,
stupid— my arms too weak,
my own chest too frail— and besides
I prefer him more….
Along spiral lines, seed-heads decay— swept away
they whirl and writhe in the hot blue fire of evening….
Stuck in a mural of sticky flesh— the family…
I am locked-in-arms with brothers
and sisters, drooping at the thighs
with nieces and nephews,
grafted to parents at the scalp, and
pasted with toddlers all over…
hived, sapped, black I sit, subject
to the flavors and aromas of your abuse….
Then— be wrapped in his presence…
crescendo to his warmth
the cascade of your laughter
search in his wrinkles
for the boy inside him…
I’m just biding here, bragless,
trying to admit these
rival-streams that flow
in one latticework of blood….
Halves of flesh and bosomy hips, lips
like dark ripe fruits they're chasing—
I chased them…
full-feathered was their hair
like floss in the sunshine
fine-fingered was their style
like laces cut to curves:
and then there was you,
returning one, just there
like the midnight moon
in my sky at noontime….
”
”