Fire burst open by a thrum of fingers, knot of melodies,
frenzy of nocturnes, clot of aches, snap & echo of wings,
a shine within, unloosed, heavens below! forest beyond!
Ask not the preacher when the muse teaches in hue.
Seek not the king when the herd is sniffing truth.
Grope for the music in your rain & your woe. Stretch.
A song, now a scent, now a beam, now a hand,
now a bowl of soup, now a small treasure, now a toy,
now what gathers, now what jingles. Now what laughs,
& what hustles, what crackles twice, & is gone.
Flare & chase, rubber smoking, time askew,
time a question, time a distraction, the hurry forthly,
random governance, oak & pine, lure & shame,
bricks build cities, men for mortar,
kings hoard lushness & leisure,
mark green things with numbers,
trees & flowers wage the sun's crusades—
weeds & shadows dance the moon's—
language too spills from the fire—
let carom by the hurry forthly—
its blight of horns & armaments—
its tomes of cajole & denial—
its banners of flame which do not smoulder—
let the shine within mock what presents
the stars as its humble rainments
let the shine within laugh & spill the cream,
give it a sweet, touch its fresh petals.
***
All is Suffering
All is suffering, so one suffers. Suffers til, perhaps,
one objects. A voice, soft as fur, sings of rain.
One suffers, yes. Til one objects, holds a kindness
within a fist, opens, tis a story, a lesson:
The trees were ragged, the crowd was poor,
the sun was an iced blur in the sky, but the pipe
went round again & again. An old man sang, of rain.
Two women danced. No hurry among empty
pockets. "All is suffering" the old man sang
but nobody believed him. The fire, the blankets,
a soup of salt & bones. The babies dreamed &
watched. A few wept. It happens. All is
suffering. Yes. So one suffers. We suffer. Yes.
***
Emergence
She kisses leaves & treetrunks, writhes smiling
beneath the brightest moon, touches my picture,
wonders about freedom. A spirit licks her face
with wind, the night softly flaps with music &
silk, & the trees trace watchful spells along her
path. The day has growled & gone with twilight,
the hurry forthly opened wide in smoke & dust.
I bear her high in my ink & heart.
She bears me in ways I can hardly even know.
Sometimes there are known devils among
bloodbound faces. Meals served with water
& mocking. Filaments of hope dimmed with a
gnarled testament—
Then a hand flicks & a candle gestures.
The chamber's walls curl with crimson incense.
A desire stays, many, beneath & beyond
the struggle. Stays. Insists.
She thinks of clean water, some future night
beneath stars, a lullaby she will create with another.
She taps me with her beauty, imbibes my
power, feeds me with berries & quiet singing.
Some buried snaps her silver friend—
After a thought, & a beat, her golden one emerges—
The moonlight has followed into her chamber—
her shoulders & hands & belly glow—
She chants while I dream, while snow falls
on my neighbor pines, throws her arms &
words far to protect me, shroud me til she shares
my bed. A ceremony of cleansing oils,
spills of moonlight, dreams of travel, hunger for home.
She dances again, & drinks more elixir—
She emerges, nearing me, little fear, little hurrying—
What's between us beginning to leaf, soon to bloom,
some day to seed, someday to riot.
***
Protection [i]
In a coffeehouse two couples sit close
amidst blue shadows & crimson incense.
The men are dressed simply, as men usually
are, ready for summons or evacuation.
The women shine, as women do, for perhaps
tonight will end softly, rhythmic linger
among lips & lace. I've sat years here, lone
& aching, my hopes growing faker & more foolish.
Tonight I sit with the new promise embodied
in a fragrant lock of hair & a merry photograph.
Tonight I know a woman's promise, & bear
thoughts of her love on its days of shell &
those of stone. She takes my hands into
her heart, into her dreams, every night,
every night. I lie nestled among the scarves
& silks of her desires, their laughter, their heat.
The coffeehouse yields to the cool of
the creamy-rendered moon, & a night
happy for miles of walking. I think of
my woman, of her voice when it sings
upon my skin, of her fingers holding closely
the pen I gave her, of the shine her dark
hair casts in her mirror as she chants
a few crafting words about protection & health—
***
Protection [ii]
The night hurried by green things, slowed
by the grey, somewhere percussion, hookahs,
the loud smells of piss & rivalry, elsewhere
disease taps large halls, lingers along
maps & ledgers, & everywhere a dance opening
outward to constellations & within to
candlelight newly pooling, blinding out dust,
a prayer overflows, two mouths touch
while awaiting, what's grey brief relinquishes,
what's green tickles madly, overtops, gleeful
smoke for our gathering, sweets leap us wildly,
elixirs & music show us how.
We make Art because we have forgotten
how to tell the truth, because some
words come out better in pigment or
flute, because our languages hardly
yet know how to speak us, because the bite
of pain yet exists, because our hearts feed from some abyss.
I have been both green thing running
& grey thing shivering, an artist scrawling
paths from scents & stars, a muse posing
rusty & bemused, an abyss urging others in,
crying others away, a seed nearly golden
among dew & tracks, a fervent radiation,
one's warning, another's pledge, a reason,
an excuse, a yowl, a purr. Tonight I press
those that honor my pen & would tangle
me among their coalescing mullings: protect her.
Tonight I rouse & raise what powers & magicks
goodly among men to do this. Look where I beckon.
We make Art to prove our intent toward
what yonder, what within. Because many
thousand nights' blood bore us we never
knew where. Gutted deer we passed. Hidden
violins among butterflies & roses. An afternoon
spent dozing in talk with a lost friend—
***
Protection [iii]
Protection: a cry this morning midst willows &
surf. Walking into dream spray, a man bears
the scarves & silks of desire, walks hot, walks cold,
walks til the path ends. Chooses to return,
or keep walking, beyond the spray, now, or back
to the preacher's boo-stories & king's simple songs.
Protection: hidden violins among butterflies &
roses. Green things teach growth. Grey things
teach huddle. The seed within: is it golden or
merely gold's shadow? Protection in the pipe's
sharing or behind the bullet? Must all be
suffering? say yea or nay.
Protection: when Beauty wages, both flags &
nocturnes burn. Green things will always
survive, grey things will always pursue.
The king now yowls greater: scriptures' noose
is ready. But Beauty rousing will crush history's
dour fist. Beauty roars, misshapes, makes anew—
***
Mercy
To play one true note & watch you dance,
cyclone, fury, chants of your hands, squeeze
of your eyes, you dance, I play, we
exchange, dream for day, one true note,
& the greed for another, many, countless
musics about your buzz, powers wild
in your brush, & thighs. One true note,
we amplify each other, become visible,
become starshine, become wisdom, become
silence. Become the mist in winter marshes,
an old man's staccato sleep, a birth-warm egg.
Become lights in the raw city, a snapping
wing, a bully shattered. True note played
against the lordly king as now he stands
preacher, an altar, a scripture. True notes
sing of questions, offer warnings, share
blessings. I would burn nocturnes & flags
alike, yea, to watch you dance, cyclone,
fury, would toss all the monsters
of my art in, see them flounder,
groan & aloft, true note, one true note,
one for our love of stone, beg
another for our love of feather,
play me, love, play my one true
note, as I play yours, while green things
laugh & stomp, grey things bluntly ponder,
what shall we be in yonder days
when coming words elude, if coming words
drown? What music purrs in our cupped hands,
what notes flick light from our fingers?
To play one true note, tonight, with
the mercy of spring rain & the hunger
of old pictures. One true note between
us, wherein we dwell, perhaps one day
big enough for the world. One true note, it's
played us all of our lives. One true note &
its hints of better days, pulsing mornings.
***
Quickening
He begged me for the lord of his younger
days, for that fiery sense of two fists
upholding his strides, a color exactly like
holiness thick within each root & creature.
He looked at me with eyes misshapen by
doubt's blurry stain, & he groaned, & said "Please."
"Had ye a wife once?" "Aye, but more than once.
A man has many wives. His women. His
tools. His faith, too, if he cedes it strength enough
to hurt him. They leave, sometimes together.
A man empties, like a town or a beach.
Trains & tides cease their coming. Aye."
He sweats & jingles his tumbler of bourbon.
Eyes my mug of water with a scoff.
"You're walking my path, too. I more than
suspect it." Drinks hard. Coughs. Taps for
more. "Pour it while yet I live & wheeze.
No poisons sweet as this beneath the ground."
"And hope, old man? Talk I hear of the quickening,
clean new days, breaches into the light
itself? Kings left boneless & preachers bereft?"
He nods, sips more slowly. "There's the
very path. Keep your hands to the oars
of this starship! Come along! See! It rises!"
The tavern eases in around us. He's told this
story before, & each time a pilgrim in
middle life listens, sucks his warning like
twas a hungry bride's nipple, & his herd
of familiars listen, twine round the old man's
pain, urge & aid him in pulling it tighter.
He nods. "Aye. So tis. The wives a man
gains & loses. The faiths & gifts & miracles
ye receive. Coins of fire! How will ye spend
them!" He stands, snaps up what remains
of his drink. Suddenly beaten, cracked apart
by why I cannot concede, he cries:
"Where is the lord I felt in my mother's
lullabies? The lord I saw hued in my
bride's cheek? Where is the lord who clung
to me with my children's hands? The one
promised me by prophets who smoked pipes with
me & buried seeds? Where? When will he come to protect me anew?"
***
Damage
I stomp the ground twice & think of you.
I kiss your tree & bid the message be sent.
My belly & heart & loins cry for you til i convulse.
Your absence flails me raw til I smile.
I dream your dreams, curse the wilds of life's mystery.
Our love an egg cracking open, cage broken. Blinding sunlight.
***
Vigilance
Tis nothing but desire makes it
so. The flame touched to candle,
or skin, scripture, cookstove.
The face drawn close with fingers
among shadows, a radio's smooth
purr. The hum of things invisible.
Or the hands bound & the sunshine
taken like a stolen bottle. A moment's
beast lunges, & again. Passed on, disappears.
Tis everything desire has made so,
& many things no law or guru could
explain. Magicks in clean water.
Manias formed among two hands
grasped & a midnight's smile. Vows
unending though seiged by every reason.
Tis nothing desire can do to untwist
its wily coiling selves. We met.
We clotted. Moons & moons of this called history.
Tis nothing but desire makes it so.
A chant for your protection, & for
mine own. A hope greenest at well's bottom.
A promise to remember your butterfly &
your beast. Call it desire, affliction,
disease. Call it love. Keep chanting.
A spray of fingers and twining of faith to heal you.
The beast that tears & smacks will
never tame but can learn a better dance.
We met. We clotted. Now a chant for
your protection, & for my own. A vow
unending I pledge to you, no guile, dream's reasons.
Tis everything desire has made so.
This world crawls with armies, & prophets,
all shadowed by beasts, alert to tear, or learn.
Let it go. Let it be. Neither hurry nor
slow. Tonight I need not sing for you, or
protect you, but I do. The beast has made me, & made me so.
***
First Spring Song
Love sticks hard. We each need to keep
breathing. Today I watch snow & pretty
branches. The drip of yesterday on wet
grass. How you looked in a picture brushes at
me over & over. Words within say "await,"
sheets of dreams hush "let it be." What's coming more
a roar than a song. An ache. A collision. A shine.
***
Second Spring Song
She holds a seed in one hand, a pen
in the other, practices one new name,
then another. Dark eyes chant for
her tribe to near, breasts & cheeks
for the artist's fingers, fancies for freedom,
memories for the burn, new days for hope.
She watches bare trees poke greenly toward
the sky, fingers two seeds now, blows out pen
after pen. Serve! Sing! Snap! Flow. Dark hair
brambling around her in the coastal air,
limbs ferocious for new quests, queer trails,
glints in the forest, freakish wonder.
Bells within hustle for a stranger kind of time,
foretell days carved & shaped with tools of light.
Three seeds jingle in her hand as she mulls
what to offer, who to receive. What to be
& how to read the patterns. Whose story her mirror
is telling. How to claim what is hers.
Neither hurry nor slow. Study & doubt
what the visible confesses but halfly.
Memory a guide, faith a guru, love a comforting noise.
Now four seeds in her pocket, two pens,
an orchid & a ribbon in her hair. She
hums brightly among her roots & wings.
When dreams riddle darkly, call for
love, cry for protection, breach the artist's
door & renew shared vow. Five seeds equal
not the senses love ignites. She will take him
fiercely, eat his skin, his soil, his flame.
Beg. Praise. Her tribe will slowly collect.
She curls among her seeds tonight,
creatures all ferocious to burst, to bloom.
Clad but in notions, lit by the moon,
calm awhile til a wiggle, & a run,
& a flash. What next? What then? Nobody
knows! Nobody can tell!
***
Faith
Faith: stunned by firecrackers, stunned by
sunlight. A kiss murmured in shadows.
Dusk radiates curtained windows, plunges
within, crushes & drinks the dreaming
vessel, neutrals the poison, extracts
the despair. Leaves evidence for later hours.
Faith: neon libraries in crumbling cities. Crowds
in arenas gilt with monster flashes. Roar.
Rise. She reads her nocturnes, sleeps hotly with
her secrets. Her lace falls off the world as
he gathers stars, bouquets of crimson feathers.
She nods & wakes up. Yes. Yes to what gallops nearer.
Faith: what strands & glues & praise become a nest.
The ways our future resembles tonight.
The first moon we share. The last. The countless
our children will mind as we sleep. She leaves
many pages blank for pictures of their dogs,
scraps from festivals, lucky spells.
Faith: a thousand miles, a truck, a wallet.
Days of soup & cornfields til we meet. A chant
for your protection, & one for my own.
A vow unending I pledge to you. No guile.
Poppies, elixirs, the fistless want of my nocturnes
& pens. All my melodies. All yours now.
Faith: when you tire, when you roam, when
you return. Stunned & helpless. I am haven.
Burnt & shaken. I am home. Hungry, smirking,
ferocious. I am your wish. As you take me,
gently maul, more bones, more blood, I serve
you that I may keep you. That I may learn.
Call you my own. Faith: flow in shadows,
laughter, alone. She moves among trees
as I listen, whispers greetings, caresses.
She makes a song, & another, needs
my help, needs her own. Faith a viper in
the grass, when it chooses, when it refrains.
***
Requited Heat
True love waits. Calls every new day
a resurrection, every pine & birch
a still mania of kind, every flaming
butterfly a twin passion toward freedom
& rest, til a collision, one with the other,
a true love who yowls, with heat, & awaits.
Pine & birch, fierce & fumble, true love
burns from the skin & raises smoke,
roars & rhymes, chants tribes of bolts,
summons dreams in flickers, better
worlds, there are better worlds, songs
which heal, touch that redeems.
True love lets go, keeps, marries
on solstice & equinox, rages crimson
pleasures in the fields of brightest
moon, true love without garments
kneel before each other, furious, raw,
stains & aches, separation, & impact.
True love waits, hard, wet, longing,
neither life nor death without each
other, in absence glowing with torn
brightness, barren laughter, deeds
briefly fine then bound for shed's
dust or attic's rot.
True love touches true love's cheek.
I appear to you, tonight, monumental,
& touch your cheek. Wherever my hand
drifts, your blood comes. Listen as
I watch you , true love, there is breath.
There is heartbeat. Resurrection. New Spring.
Then again, just a room. The renewed entreaties
of a life mild with friendly noise.
True love waits, listens for the path,
little lost for the stumbling away,
torrid & shrieking the coming nights of
reunion, years of hard bliss. Shock of true love, renewed.
***
Vow
Neither life nor death without you,
by brightest moon or darkest.
No path from midnight to morning,
from starfall to dream's daze.
No hands we feel nor lights for song
nor fire for dance & meat.
Then our vow renewed & the dark places
within shiver hard, & recede.
The night nods, & gives way, opens
again to our protection, chants & nocturnes.
We create each other anew, from oak leaves
& black ink. Longing breast & spiraling light.
***
Possession
Breast fierces for breast, fingers for fingers,
tongue for lips, skin smokes with want,
desire the fuel from abyss to abyss,
bed or earth the pyre, true love cannot
be scratched from the blood, true love
a clash of birthing loins, new haven shaped
by immolation. the city a crossing of electric
rods & wild flows, creatures thrashing powers,
shadows beating shadows, prayer in a thrust,
desolation in withdrawal, hope in a blind
kiss, in how I take your hands again & how we will not let go.
How I learn your curves, how you study my
breath, how the world allows what we insist.
My songs about old men & candy canes pink
your face with laughter. I dress you in blooms
& shaman elixirs. You moan for more. You give
me what's left. We share secrets like water.
Our heat joins in shiver, vibrating in
ocean waves & chanting moonlight.
Love leaves nothing infirm to live.
Love plants, dances, makes. Love teaches
why, desire makes it so. What scars remain
when every wall is down now ours to bear,
to clean, to own. Perhaps a morning many
hours hence, a meal, a marketplace,
a pipe passed on a harbor's bench. Apples &
ferryboats. Music for tramps, pilgrims, &
freaks. Perhaps yesterday's clouds remain
to mumble of context & continuity. Perhaps
you ask me: what do we have? I say we have
love. Only love. Dream of the heat of the world.
Love. We have only love. The persistent & samely
shaped stains in things. Love. We are now only
love. A rampage, a gleam, a way. Love. Only love.
Cryptic twining, a gift, great lights, new language.
New dream. Bigger dream. No longer a dream
at all. Faith. What happens when faith explodes.
***
Chant
Call it a chant. Call it a wound.
Call it love. Glistening berries in your
dreams. Fire warming a mourning family.
Call it my vow unending to your possibilities,
to you as raging sunshine, diminishing
butterfly. Everything twists. Call it a chant.
Call it love.
Bring your brutaled thighs, your forlorn depths,
bring them to me, bring flowers & mushrooms,
wear the dress you dream me seeing you wear
the day we wed, the day we make our baby,
bring your princess highs & vacant hours &
suicide plans & watercolors of our love
painted on bark. Soon we'll nod & call it a life.
Watch me approach you in return,
watch my face clown its adoration &
feel my hands growl & pursue, watch
my will melt in sugary swoon & how
my lips continue to stroke you long
past midnight's dour & dawn's exhaustion.
Open the curtains. Yet another day. Dance. Wiggle.
We'll go, hurry for the milk, the bread,
talk about our many endings, talk
about what will not quit, talk about who
we used to be, wonder what we are.
Befriend each other anew. Decide not
to come down this time. Call our love
a carnival in the desert. Another breath. Another.
Maybe right now just a couch & a silken
rose. A wish for stars to log our chamber,
for trees to cede us our place in the circle.
Maybe right now a chant hidden among
heartbeats, a wound by pill unsolved but mute.
A fire remembered, a vow still fierce.
Call it love. Call it a chant. Everything twists.
***
Prayer
Universe we beseech thee, midst
the jungles & caverns of beasts we contrive