1 Electrocardiogram
The city structures are an irregular
EKG readout. or a sprawling
symphony. the
drunks
wobble in the crescendo and slosh
down crisp whiskey
while
the fluorescent moonlight illuminates all those
hearts that
slowly
beat themselves out
***
2 White
In
the winter, the
conifers morph into
snow
angels, their
cold stubby cocks
sing carols.
She whistles and skips viscera across the frozen lake; he
looks up from the page and squeals, “I can tell you
love me by the way you
italicize me!”
This is
a poem a-
bout the death of Jack Spicer.
***
3
Diminishing Returns
Fog plods down the street in silent
shapes of buffalo. go. begrudgingly trudging through the
mud and sludge of memory. we're never
alone when we can't
remember anybody else. ember limbs enclosing limber
lovers. briefly luminous. in lopsided homes with
aluminum siding. along long lonely
lanes with overused names. quaint
revisionism. makes saints of winners. history's
unoriginal sin. circling
slowly. perpetually reducing speed by half
at irregular intervals so never coming to a
stop. this stuttering streetscape. your staggered
speech. your strutting sentimentality. the ashen striation
of stratus clouds. the stammering light of the
stars. straddling bridges. straying through time like lost
elopers. the scope is
abridged. the outlook grim. the inlook grievous.
***
4 Pathology
Fire ants flow along a sidewalk crack. clouds flout
form, floating shapelessly toward
some other place. your mother had
crazy gray wispy cirrus hair. With an
involuntary virility, you hallucinate
fat monks in summer in a circle disrobing in a cul-de-sac positioned precisely in
some suburban samsara. so sweaty. so
yesterday.
so
much time squandered finding so
much pointless purpose. Wandering
deep into the night. stopping
sporadically to read Wilde in the gutter, paranoid that the
stars are looking at you.
