1
Fitting into tree moss
held by daughter or deer tracks,
I follow a gully of leaf dust;
some things cannot be recovered
some things cannot be taken back.
Tractor rust, barbwire holly, night-works of
crumbling soft logs; smaller and smaller
the guise of it becomes;
I plant myself among the lucky ones:
bent limbs, broken stems, overhead and underfoot.
2
Roads are lifted off weeds and evergreens
and naked spokes no one travels here on purpose,
stopping only to hollow out. But
I'll keep a trunk beneath me 'til calendars
fill with Winters and I'm razed to ash for fleeti
cored to the center of a butterfly heart
the dark star borrows
from everyone
(oh, you'd like to pluck) my melanin feathers
there! aphotic blood
burn, sweet poison
your swivel head now fixated
rouge flush, bruised with pink
your slick lamella glows
from the dying occident:
a halo that crowns your blood-lighted skin
the night hoods and blinks
and i dawn into you
an urgent spate of motility
daggers out your buried volt
harpooning my cardia, my bursa collared
i'm hoisted up like ocean game
and into your ready teeth
shuddering at the thought of words
murdered in each sequent
under heel of our alloted sun, leucous aeriform through the blots
i give up
all resemblances, the gall to flower, the right to bear flesh
to seize arms from the stockpile;
i'm alone for it.
i feel the vim of irides, typhlotic whiskers bleaching through.
i'm oily broken up
watermixed, escalloped; i wonder, can i trace my fluke in shimmers
'round the burnout-white corona?
can i feel myself
deliberating
in puddles
wavering
the craniums
of dark hadels
shining blind colour
in empty
anatomies?
we saw it: the blood⋅edge of a co⋅balt grin
nosh⋅ing fosse a⋅round the cloud⋅flats
bra⋅zen trow⋅el⋅ler of bull⋅i⋅form blue
la⋅cun⋅as
and here, we float a⋅bove it, sky⋅dirt⋅charms
with our droll car⋅tel of paint thin⋅ning words;
it's du⋅bi⋅ta⋅ble, now, how we'll go on
from here
since we've suf⋅fered the a⋅zure⋅brand, our
drift⋅wood truths are mean float⋅ers
scan⋅ty, space⋅wrecked, out⋅of⋅print
lost in na⋅ked
at⋅mos⋅phere.