floating and leaving no trace
autumnal orange light floods the parking lot
while soft snowflakes fall
even though these aren’t snowflakes
even though the greasy stink of smoke gives it away
hills burn
and wind pushes ash toward the sea
i hope the sunset–at least–
will be beautiful
——
the sun rolls in a rut
in heaven each day
spiraling lower
and lower still
like a skee-ball
thrown so hard it pops into the outermost ring
zero tickets for the effort
i want to wrap you up
like a snake
i want to swallow you whole
and feel you inside me
clawing your way out
the way words and dreams
used to claw their way out
before i got fuzzy and dumb and tired
i want to remember
the names i called you by
i want one of them to be a magic word
that will make you happy
without anyone losing an eye
low on the horizon
i pinch the sun
between my fingers
smaller than a dime
that orange bastard
has been trying to
give me cancer for years
let it roll beneath the horizon
for all i care
i’ll put my head in the sink
fill it with water
and wait for the mermaids
to start singing
how did my hands
get so heavy
and why do they weigh
so much
even when i
am asleep
you say
–see you tomorrow
i can’t help but be astonished
at the clarity
the unassuming confidence
in those three words
any one of which might
be overtyped with hyphens or Xs
of course you expect a tomorrow
you had one yesterday
but past performance is
no guarantee of future results
and we’re all asking ourselves
that question these days
what about that presumption
of my being here
i’m old
getter older at an alarming rate
and i’m not exactly in great shape
not that i’m in particularly bad shape
either but even if we rule out disease
we can’t rule out accident
it’s those other drivers
(not you and certainly not me)
i’m worried about
barring disaster
what if i oversleep and decide
to hell with it
the world’s not going end
if i don’t get out of bed
then we come to your eyes
those fabulous eyes
liquid soft like autumn rain
who’s to say you won’t eat a bad
cookie and the bacteria
will specifically target your optic nerve
or that you be driven to some
wholly inappropriate oedipal frenzy
–see you later
is how i reply
keeping it vague
keeping it hopeful
keeping it light
the when of you
an exhibition of
my ten thousand pieces
–miss alignment?
–no, mrs
clocks offer offspring
wound/ed/ in the knees
and the stars
winkin blinkin and nod
off
my ten thousand pieces
brokered bartered battered
before the sun went down
when you were
——
every word from your mouth
is a hammer driving nails into my skull
drive like a truck driver, oil-stained cap
naked chrome women on the mudflaps, 10-4, good buddy
every breath out
the fall of the hammer against a nail
embedding itself in wood
it’s own act of will of volition speaking
squeaking as it crawls into the grain
remember when we were kids
and tried to drive in a nail with a single blow
into wood that was probably meant for
something other than keeping us amused
how many galvanized skewers did we ruin
bending them into right angles
or that time
you chased me across the street with a golf club
blood ran down my face
and mixed with the taste of candy cigarettes
you came for me again with a bat
days after the first stitches came out
the sound in my head was like a hammer
hitting an anvil and those words squeaked
as they crawled into my brain
and they said
kronos signed his name
to the application
turned it in
still attached to the clipboard
though it fit awkwardly
in the inbox
the social worker
looked over the form
he thought how much
this looked like the dmv
–all government offices are the same
she looked up at his mutter
and he coughed, covering his mouth
–this says here
that you’ve been a father
before. can you explain
why you want to adopt?
he looked into the
shadowed corner behind her
in the small office
–hungry
only the dead are perfect
perfect in silence
you say
oh, so-and-so is at peace
and you are not wrong
but the dead
keep moving
like a handful of
shining white teeth
flung
into a still pond
ghostly white
fading
as
they
descend out of sight
while above
ripples ring
and crest
you measure the
depth of each trough
as it slices through you
the silence of the dead
is the roar of the furnace
only the perfect dead
move without moving
windows 10, my own
personal hell–why won’t you
boot up
i serve
you like i serve
myself, i like your serve
serving me self-service reserved
for me
Words and Feathers 