3-16-09

this is what I refer to as
the explosive quality of waiting.

fingernails dig into the palms of soft pillows,
of the way we carry ourselves

down and out into the air, the afternoon,
this in-between season.

how fitting that it is warm,
cool, all temperatures falling
under the category of “not quite.”

Surface

I dive headfirst into the world
without worrying if I will
crack my head against the cement.

let red ribbons leak out,
climb towards the surface.

there are tiny cities in my chest, 

with rosy girls dimming 

their bedroom lights

one by one, 

arms outstretched 

from slender windows,

fingers frigid and white,

reaching out to find the core,

the point of emanation.

in waking dreams,
men in harnesses cling to shingles,
work to demolish a cupola

exposing the ribs of a great bell,
the hull of a boat that scratches the sky.

are there ghosts 

in our future?

are there stones glistening

in our heart-streams?

this is not a poem about longing.

I am done with longing,
says my pink swirling brain
and gnarled lungs.

My heart argues back,
hurling retorts, smashing glasses,
wheezing between its stammering.

do I stop and collect my cracked knuckles?
do I stand as still as a wide-eyed doe on the roadside?

Do I wait for the crash,
or leap back into the underbrush?

12-8-08

it is too difficult to have just one,
each kiss a spark
in and of themselves.

lips in unison.


the heat is off
and yet I am still warm,
bare arms in the cold,

windows too clouded
to see the river

(that I suppose is)
flowing dark and whistling
into this night.


is this what electricity feels like?


like placing a sugar cube
on your tongue,

waiting for the volts
to hit your veins,
make them dance?



we are an entanglement
in the heart of an apple,

nestled in seed-stars,
wound in the white.

She’s Like the Canary in the Coal Mine for All of Us

breath drawn back into perfect circles,
circumference of heart and beating wings,
we can survive in this black.

who decided to crawl down into these depths,
these places where songs
trip and tumble to the center of it all?

clenched jaws in sleep,
thighs tight under covers,
sleep is scuffed shoes,
things you meant to pack but didn’t.

we all need some saving grace,
a glint of a future that hums like harmonicas.


we have lungs,
so we use them to make blossoms,
to pass our breath into another rosy mouth.

Of Root Canals and Stalled Poems

..like so much perfume in your mouth
a flurry of chalky moths fluttering in a small space.

my nerves are rattlesnakes and tooth-smoke.

there’s nothing worse than a poem,

hurtling into your ear, mid-written,

as you recline in the dentist’s chair,

a room full of licorice and

fingers empty of a pen.

wings huddled in china,
cupped between trembling hands.


     my tongue is a silken building in the middle of
      momentary hailstorms, star-showers.

Ricochet

We ricochet. Come back to this blue where we began,
our oars poised to crack the water’s surface. is this where
the humming started? Where our overstuffed hearts, crammed
into Buicks and planes, converged in Pittsburgh, a city of even
more convergence? Happy is as happy does and I’ve stopped worrying
for the time being. Being is what I want & need & I will fuel our
upcomings with full lungs and a song-heart. Forever means for always, evermore, for ever and ever, for good, for all time, until the end of time, until hell freezes over, eternally, forevermore, perpetually. This.