the moon is underweight
and pale faced; searching for
her eldest daughter

a
nest
of
orphaned
honey
bees
singing
hymns
under
yer
skin

tiny
bone
in
your
throat
and
it's
finally
over

traveler's kiss

you find that by releasing
your feather tipped fists
you can form a bowl
to receive the blood and water
as if your sheltered consciousness
is
dripping
from
the
wrists
of the writhing Pacific
as the swirling air confesses
to a lone woman licking her lips
tasting salt and rust
assurance and myth
knotting braids to tether
her lungs to the function of breathing

she's seeking a hollow harness
to loop around the deep scar
of a long lasting resistance

He wrote some lines, trying to remember the whole paragraph, but
failing, lines from Hermann Hesse's 'Demian'-..."because of my evil and
misfortune I stood higher than my father and the pious, the righteous..."

I almost wrote "eveil" and crossed it out-as if evil
veils something that is not evil as we understand it-a gift-live-
evil-veil-

-Denis Johnson
Already Dead

evaporation

the painted gated is padlocked
but the pasture beyond it
is swollen with abbreviated conversation
that no defining line can defend

a descending and wayward storm is torn in half
smothering the voices before you can
reach into eternity
to identify the source of these native pleas

if only you were listening
rippling the weary stillness
with concave silver
just before i came
into this translucent yearning
with heavy colors
and forgetful rain

maybe you'll fall faster
than an ordinary man
when a latent noose
slips over the skyline
and silence makes demands
of any budding promise
and every future tear
suspended on the tip
of yer humid testaments
like fog clinging to it's fear

you
have
been
digging
in
the
suicide
mines
all
yer
life

ladybug
carcass
and
the
harness
he
hitched
to
yer
rib
cage

when half of
the moon refuses to
follow through