In my glitter book
I write stories.
Adverb symphonies,
I explain preciously.
Expediently
is always precocious.
The problem with plot
is a lack of self-awareness.
Leaving my pen to face
her fears on the precipice
of the table,
I see the morning’s
crumbs
rearrange—
spell,
but why should I care?
Rivers of diamond water
cascade along the coast.
Men dip their hands in the water
come out like living seizures.
Coming and going in the rivers,
Laser beams.
Women on the shore
Collect sharp rocks.
My husband is cloaked
in information.
When he slips my pelerine
off my shoulders,
the heat of my borrowed home
sinks into my chest,
exhausted.
Mouth on mine,
he breathes empire into me.
Always his tongue studded
in stats.
Interested,
I absorb his mind.
I absorb everything.
I absolve the world of nothing.
My husband kisses me
with countries I’ll never see.
With all his facts he
warms my figure.
In the shadow behind the drapes,
heart aglow and beating,
living illustration of a lost
red charm.
Allergic to light,
he is happy when unnoticed.
Children talk about him.
Houseplants have faith in him.
The sun-soaked parents don’t believe.
The oysters were alive
when mother extracted
Her pearls.
It is in the dim hiding
places that being is born.
Frightened,
the children watch the feet
that peep out from under the drapes
shift.
The dawn makes much of me,
flooding as she does
over the delta of dark.
The cowardice of night,
the dryness on the dark,
amaze me like
the paranoia at the foot of
my bed,
gnawing his hands
and begging for bandages.
Dawn always grows up.
Noon holds me in
a vice grip,
and I yearn for my shadow
and his praise of me.
Slowly,
sun turns to chaos
and things separate.
Evening falls like linen
on my hair.
Holier,
I brave the coming dark,
already thirsty,
as the light flows
to her next season.
(The celestial sobbing
of a year cut short.)
When the world ends,
we will all be high,
laughing at the telenovelas
we have lived.
The fire will clash with ice.
But where it all really
breaks down
is the anticipating
burning in the dumpster.
Like champagne
the old distrust bubbles
out from my upturned tumbler.
Now there is nothing
but trust.
(We all know how it ends.)
Oval angels
make math difficult
The leaves have turned white.
They know what that means
and don’t want to
talk about it.
On paper,
the universe is as dull as
a towel.
The universe as a theory
reminds me of an
old riverbed.
In practice,
it is a high, drunken girl
looking to get away.
The angels always
keep the music,
numbers just out of reach.
The moon casts a shadow
on my bed.
The cat scratches at the door.
It isn’t mine—
the cat or the door.
Splayed across my bed,
an ancient dream
just vaguely glossy.
In the well of his eyes
a songbird drowning,
his last note shaking
the earth like an aftershock
Carrying a cane,
he mocks old age
and then beats him with it.
The various compounds in his
organs like chasms of
darkness sewn up into life.
In his neighborhood
the children shirk their
playful duties
break all the rules of youth
by filing taxes
and reading Schopenhauer.
In the bushes,
a sharpened surprise
awaits him.
The cloth Christ
hangs from the
peg on the wall.
My voice is in a vault.
God gave me the gift,
and he holds the key.
If I ever speak again,
my voice will be an Easter.
I am cold.
God’s son will warm me.
Lent falls off my life
Like a damp towel.
The vault door opens.
My singing rises in
praise of the risen.
Miniature Moon 