cornerstone

si vous




blood blends in with pools
of liquid; the thickness
of it all is meaningless.
when it comes to drowning
there are only a few pairs
of hands i want wringing.
the peal of heaven, the plunge
of freefall: crystal cuts deeper
than our roots. the family tree
smells like nooses. it hurts
looking up with all the crinks
in these skeletons of ours.
i felt the penny dust on my tongue
before the red even hued
but no one said anything
about the blood on my collar.
some dogs have turned up
missing. by turned up
i mean face down in drainage
ditches & i told you already
blood doesn't matter anymore.
someone is someone no matter
how thick their divots. even monks
tend to jump from their dome stones
to see whether or not they were wrong.
don't get me wrong, i say this
with love and an entire zoo
of tempests, of quiet loathing
i say this that the diamonds
in my teeth do not care
whether or not your blood mingles
with mine in any way: if someone
deserves to have my jaw
snaked around their neck,
i am already wide open
hissing on the river banks.
you would be surprised
how strong the scent of
weak links has become.
i do not think it's the weather.

up

& out on the prowl
the sky is like poop
but the sky is something
i would actually hold
by choice inside me

up & at them
the whites of nebula
no eyes or voices in black.
what about faster than light?
it took twelve years to find
the space between energies
& the fraction of negation betwixt.

up & around, i have
been. i have been
like layers of rock
and will be like
the outer reaches unpaved
with the laser pointer of
god's eyes. don't you
ever wonder what he
looks like when he sleeps?

up & down the rabbit
hole, a bridge through
the apple. if my hands
were gods hands
i would never stop
landscaping. the gardens
of stars tethered to
other heavens heave
without anyone to see.

it would take all of infinity,
both circles and all the orbits
of our galaxy to spin
up & around again. why stop
now when we have
come so far? look
at how much light
we have yet to receive.

certain degrees of want,
the smallest circle around
everchanging numbers like 40
or 136 depending on your hips
on how happy you are to
watch me wander in

not wandering, i know
where we ought to end up:
the glum dumb atlantic
the monster fucking whirling
animal that blacks the shores
with acute departure. not really
lusting either at the end,
it just seems sort of
sad when you think about it.

if you ever think about it &
i want to ask you
while you sleep, where does
the universe end & will you
hurl me off the edge?
i would very much like to see
if fall can find me faster
than i undoubtedly can find
the fall & it isn’t even april.

On Your Porch

Weathered and here
I am, mining your sea floors
for farther parts

of wings and kidneys:
vestigial parts when
all I need are arms,

the coif of your neck.
A freefall into bedlam,
I swear I am inside it.

Ready or not I swear you
won’t writhe away from me.
You are no overblown wolf.

Like I said, been mining
for emeralds or your eyes,

a way to make you tremble.

The lawn feels damp

these few days, I been collecting
dew, building a better cocoon.

caved like Chile
I am, trying the back door,
 here where vultures wait

for men like me to fall
in love with breakers
like you, icebergs

that ruin the biggest boats,
the unsinkable nature
of promise & regardless

I’m outside, now, caving.

I’ll tear down the damn fence
now olly olly oxen free.

Learning

write about bad things,
the fucking devil in everything.
a serpent beguiling, crooning
on high untouched cedar branches.

write about fake ancient creation then,
my ribs maybe ate a fruit first
but dammit if my wrists aren’t emptier still.
or write about the dangling of halos

crooked on crags where manna blossomed
& some glimmering history got carved
in blood all wrong. the bears could glare me
into ghost if i go know their woods a while.

write the luck out of things & coil
tiny problems all tensely:  this one
or that one; write of tending all the flowers

in Eden forever & how bad the snake problems getting.

Honest Answers

you asked over waffles how far

the farthest was I ever gone for pussy.

well once i ended up in Texas to taste
a girl with dick sucking lips, i said,
but she never proved the namesake.
you however should definitely know
that i would much rather make love
most mornings to the most intimate corner
of your throat, but that sounds slipping

and who would I be to surge too fresh,

forgetting who tucks in the corner of the beds.

there’s already a frown now forming so

i can put this a little prettier:
O my papillion my thornless rose tree

i am arctic should you drift, melting over shoulders.
your body is a museum impregnable,
i am breaking in, flittering through your masterpieces.
you are the quick graze of comets, an eclipse

that i will stare at wide-eyed,
but settle for brushing sides of walls
if it means you are the last O angel you
sight to be seen, among everything.

i pick you over the sea grasses,
the baobab and the ghosts of horses
whinnying about weather within you,
the orange hue of London dusk
and all the hope waiting quietly
at the deep dark bottom of the Trevi.

 ⁂

if it is like a kite string
and way up there then most likely must
be painted yellow, tight tied with lightbulbs
flashing morse code & swinging.

whether the wind means to or not
it will likely fray fast  and the holes strung through

the forests will undoubtedly wither, we will need to perform
repairs & the occasional rain dance to maintain
the quiet line floating high that keeps us hooked.
something like a bridge between one river and another
 ripe with maybe seven states in the middle.
young bear cubs in the woods will paw at the sky
to try and tear the line in the winds but by
the grace of elevation, persistence & a little duct tape
things that are bound to succumb to falling

hold up a fist that isnt really there & flick off
the nagging throat of distance.
if it is so high that sometimes we lose track,

throw snowballs skyward to see what catches
then we might remember the importance of stringing

along things & bursts that aren’t really there but touching

ever slightly