the body is an excuse to be here /
favored for leaving tracks on this orb /
remember when the moon moved with a gesture /
and to cry was a current flooding the dam /
now, the many nows, leave a stutter diverting to the ditch /
where low-light mumbles during interrupted sleep /
are the gospel of aging organs
each to their waiting coffin as warm as morning coffee /
made of newspaper clippings, magazine articles and marked-up indexes /
all that was read that became flesh, bruising against the day’s corners /
the coffin folds up, pocket-size, always at the ready for short or long falls /
but mostly it leans against the wall behind the couch, creaking in the furnace draft /
until a frigid dawn when its door freezes open and the lines layered with iced breath/
break apart into random blocks at the feet, too far for hands
a dollar down gets moral outrage /
and a take-home bag of assumptions /
plus a self-righteous tan /
like Chuck Heston on the beach /
howling the twist out past waves /
to plastic shores of crumbling developments /
where armies plan their offensive against fluoride /
unaware their best books /
are written by foreigners /
living in the basement
here’s to the meteor being a little nearer next time / close enough to feel its dusty hot breeze in our eyes / close enough to tarnish the silver for sunday dinner / close enough to rub the dog’s hair the wrong way / close enough to knock out a few nails in the treehouse / close enough to tilt the required flag poles / close enough to part the reservoir / close enough to flip a few 0s and 1s / close enough to light every neighborhood street adequately / close enough to brighten the days with an equal sheen for all
nearly there aiming for /
approximate average quote /
space beside the specific /
that pushes the ship past gravity /
a clear trend line fueling /
a looting of unexpected shares in expired suburbs /
the same thing they sold /
backward shorthand if you don’t speak the ease/
all one spend convenient blanched currency /
dare say “what?” at /
the community gate
comfort causes pain /
sitting still disturbs grasshoppers mulling over their next locust move /
no fortified strong backarm doesn’t /
crack the clavicle already bent over stateless /
motionless in a room diminished every thing /
its easy to remove the body from the heart
there is the chickadee as the chickadee before /
fist-sized energy pronouncing some incremental turn of the planet /
what they build is a world no less /
of lending a wing to currents and tremors /
see what I do, lighting to a perch on which the earth rests
what continues to be said in absentia of the frail points separating the highway where we would prefer to collide neither giving way / as is after a snow storm, laying claim to the entire parking lot with the dividers hidden and so all space is taken without those faded agreements
in 1909 buildings and trees and grass and sky pressed up against the glass /
flattening out to colourful stains /
glowing green, ripe blue, heated yellow /
how could anything live in Murnau? /
all the space where oxygen widens is squeezed /
people gladly slice through razor thin doorways /
blackbirds fly up or down only, frantic for a hidden perch /
and as the air escapes through the crack at the bottom of the scene /
citizens forget how to speak
grave matters /
it really does /
our closing dimensions /
unruly edges pressed down with spit /
two sets of lines falling parallel /
never crossing /
as is the meaning allowed /
a hole passed around /
at best, a novel definition lands /
stretching h x w /
to a landscape