FOLDING SEQUENCE

God preserves 

in floods and quakes—

impacts thrash straits

without escape

No crown nor color

just landslide grace—

constructed collapse

a melted face

Not mauled by malice 

but beaten in time—

the seed agape

a muddy line

Cut deep by force

elegance and space—

what ends in ruin

becomes a place

CONSUMMATION —

Roots bloom up into the sky

Where a life consumes a life

A spider weaves a violent thread
In mother's harsh delight

A husband's back

The touch of his wife

A mix of dark and light

No words need said

Slip into the bed

You know you've

Done alright 

WOLF CRIES —

no one came to save her

but it wasn't the first time
she made threats

she was likable 

and persuasive
even talked me

off a ledge once

made me supper

at her place

but

no one came to save her
and she asked forgiveness

from God in her last words

i keep seeing her 

at the edge of the dock 

howling and wailing

waiting for someone 

to show up and 

help her fight

in the end though

no one came to save her
but three-hundred people 

cried at her wake

sang amazing grace

myself among them

APPLICATION —

You become 

every moment

you become
 

PRETTY DAMN GOOD —

2 young females sit on
my right and talk in a
soft urgent tone,
probably about
their love life

to my left is a couple
who stare continually into
each other's eyes and
laugh about everything
and nothing at all

the Vietnamese cooks are behind
me chattering loudly

I don't speak Vietnamese
so I tune them right out
like the buzz of
electric lights

others are everywhere
talking about this, that
and the other thing

they are angry, happy,
sad, in the middle,
unsure, and together

in the seat directly across 

from me sits no one

just a pair of ivory chopsticks

I know what must be done
and I dot it

THE WAY IT IS —

I understand nothing
except maybe

solitude
drunkenness
and loneliness

that looking
an angry man in the eyes
makes him more angry

that the factory men are
always better company

I am hardly real

and
there is no roof over
the mountains

THE CORONER —

tables typically turn
too late
too gone

the warmth of wrath
replaced by distance
the light roots
held before
the dark

a procedure precisely
lacking
in time 

_

PLAYTIME —

Mama cow

baby cow

chicks to hens

baby cow

mama cow

spirals spin

around and

around again

beginning 

to end

mama cow

baby cow

now

then

DINOSAUR —

Leaves are falling
Green, yellow, orange, red
Countenance out a third floor window

Cold innocence, cracked eggs

And terrible lizards 

Abound

BARREL JUMPER —

Loops lead

to a nest

a lime

a sunflower

camels in deserts

spiders in webs

the barrel of the wave

GOD IS —

a force

a pounding

a hammer 

a nail

a piercing

the surface 

the substrate

symmetry 

sprawling

no end 

in sight

__

LIL —

I pass through the space
Upright and silent
Her mother
The wind on
My back

Hushed tones
Ripen and press

Our eyes and breath
Flutter together
Along the jetty

Throned and washed
Throughout by
Force

GOD IS A HAMMER —

Arguments of
white supremacy

are

arguments for
white supremacy

 

YOU'RE A VICTIM —

caught in an
intersection
of braces
projected
over
atrophied
limbs and
core

SNAPSHOT BANGKOK 4:01AM —

and i’m sitting on an

elevated sky train platform

eating a sandwich

below the people sit on the street 

drink and play music

as the trash men

collect trash

the working girls sit around 

legs crossed 

one heel 

bouncing

they sit and wait as the men

pass by, pass by, 

and pass by

they sit there showing leg

saying the same phrases

over and over

about a block away 

a door man is tipped  

while an elevator rises 

and falls again

a plane passes overhead

and four people 

look up

as the plane moves into the distance

a rat and a dog square off

both suspended in their 

battle rituals

men stand on the corners counting 

their money, swallowing 

their ethics, and sweating

the birds start their song

and i stand up and begin 

walking toward my room

i move onto the street 

and look ahead

as it all passes away 

into the strange space we call

history.

GOODBYE KOI —

the koi is a common fish

and actually a type of

garbage eating carp.

but if you’re perceptive

every now and then 

you’ll find magic

in this tragically 

ordinary fish. 

it’s something that 

captivates the mind

stimulates the body 

punctures the soul.

and when you find this sort

you follow it first with 

your eyes then with

your feet.

and while you know the common

nature of the fish you follow it 

still, often with amazement.

well soon enough either the koi

or you move on to new 

waters and that 

is that.

but in the meantime you follow

the fish thinking that one day

you’ll see it again in a 

different pond

a new tank 

or washed up dead somewhere 

but knowing that

you probably won’t.

ZERO GROUND —

there is nowhere left to go

no place to move on to
i have eaten
my family
or they have
disappeared

INFIRMED —

a terminal fatigue

seized in love letters
we're told she tried
to resesutate the
body for days

A CARNAL HYPOTHESIS —

confined to a leaky and sinking old boat
confined by change
by the aware yet archaic brain
by the thought
the emotions
by evolution
for or against

restricted by the lungs
neuro-plasticity
choice
fallacy
and function
constrained by rightness
and non-essential wisdom

confined to the limiting possibilities
limited by time
the four directions
Newtonian physics
metaphysics
quantum mechanics
oxygen
and ether

confined by imprecise language
by imprecise education
by certainty and uncertainty

encircled by the world-savers
the time-wasters, the paper-faced

ensnared by the black mosquito
or mile marker 146
or this time
or no time
or anything
less than
more than
or nowhere

confined by the lines in the road
by 29 miles to go

confined in ability
confined in unknown bias
unknown and known galaxies
known and unknown loves
confined by this poem
there or here
back and forth
or not back and forth

drowning in impotent ideas
morals, values, ethics
or lack thereof

confined by no judgment
or too much judgment
or just enough
or just right

deadened by politeness
by tambourines
by porcelain
or locomotives of faith
pounding on you like
broken piano keys

sedated by the rising concrete
and moreover, and therefore

forced under by too much
or not enough

forced under by rotted vegetables
or a burnt out headlight

confined by psychological voyeurism
peering in during the last
moments of solitude

or perhaps
confined by underwater warfare
by changing sides
and walking home afterward
shoes blow to smithereens

being set free by the breathtakingly plain
and ultimate conclusion
is as decent a thing
as anyone can know

MAGNOLIA PLAINSMAN —

Magnolias gesture in solitude, until morning
Over roped-roots, petals emerge in Spring
The sky still weeps against the passing
Fragile petals fill, shed their pretense
Fall easily to the ground
And underfoot are crushed
Into the soil

Magnolias remain impossibly, against their mourning
Submerged petals restore the flora of another Spring
Possibly the same blossoms, same roots
Resurrected anew in ecstatic absorption
Stronger than yesterday
Weaker than tomorrow