Archive | January, 2018

“Roasted Suits”

11 Jan

“Roasted Suits”

I hardly care at all

your innocent sunshine,

feckless pigeons

when a cold night blows

you feel the cuts and welts

in every hiccup

a fear of life

eyes in a bubbling stream

while rabbits stained with blue powders

dive for sunken treasure

the tattooed map undulates

on the skin of the drowned giantess

mice rush down the city streets

and no one can hear their scratch

the three-headed duke

plays with bones

less the bedsheets be spread

and all wounded tomorrows

try to keep a chin up

through cracked windshields,

lowering the frosty buckets

terror-filled life why did we come

if your body is a halo

for expired exaltations

the like of which are crowned

with raven feathers, hand spices,

and the delinquent energy

so often admired.

We’re trying to make the best of things

till we’re really not here at all

in a vicious wind

to collect our mittens back.

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“Shadow Blanket”

10 Jan

“Shadow Blanket”

Who is that horrible man?

He’s my best friend.

He used to throw parties

across the scream

between the lungs

blind banks, directionless flowers

the parchment for the deed

sick as the wick,

treacle lazy man river’s locks.

You don’t care about anyone.

You’re a drug addicted to a drug

of the purple storm clouds

of the hail flesh, harebrain triggers

dynamo icicle gateways

ladyblood neck braces

leach swans on an autumn lake.

We sit at the dinner table in the dark

and eat insects

forever the rays absorb

your generation pushed aside,

the brief eclipse

fell off the picking wagon

to the catacomb of cannibals

police cars sing in the distance

however fragile the eggs we protect

control our minds

terrible instincts bitten by sharks

sharpened by religious holidays

when you rocked in the attic

outlasting space travelers

who brought you dancing flowers,

cyclones of mist,

though I lie awake, sister,

when roots

cover the true faces of the birds

the human faces

velvet collusion and veils

we hang glide above the treetops

dusting our frost cantaloupe

to gallop the ruins

of our stereo

made up life

you were the king and the queen

stars sweating your thighs.

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“Oaken Chest”

9 Jan

“Oaken Chest”

Return to a schoolhouse from the past

to vanish your memories

we never got the chance to grow older

yesterday’s cereal boxes

written on childhood caves

as the oxen shower

in a transitional fever

parkas soak from green to black

warm years turned moldy

talking with stilts

in an abandoned house

where we were alive once

alive and well…

or as much as anyone else

creeps the alleys, fangs the tigers

what was lost.

That’s the most horrible story

in all the world.

Is the teller deceased?

Has he broken his vows?

We played in the woods

lost on milk cartons

you never saw us

the ghost of your past harm

though we saunter

past gravestones serene

leave a little locket by your bedside

powder box of dreams

to vanish your memories.

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“Dart Targets”

8 Jan

“Dart Targets”

The choice is your misery

below you I spit

gurgling blood

runaway again, my horses sincere

in a carriage made of bones

warm journey

through the soul of a rodent

call the flood back to this cave

breed me a cyclops

a dinner end deserted star

coal evenings

burned your name to this bracelet

broiled from the evening sun kiss

lemon-scented, pill-bleached

delivery to inhuman moons,

baler of destroyed pianos

sonnet-stripper of devilish whims

toxic bricklayer of departed vistas

your watery hands rowing

belt of the reef.

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“Legend of Winnebago”

7 Jan

“Legend of Winnebago”

Cross hairy arms

the saint of scars

is heaven-scent

and angels cry their wings.

Past schoolhouses,

bitter misers,

schoolmistress shooting up,

the tarmac deciduous,

the bishop’s perm,

stone gargoyle

the pasta of intestine

roving to mimic

starving to startle

weird scars and markings

behind your mirror

of make-up scraping evenings

the end of a dream.

Let the lock sleep with the key,

it’s his turn to let the mouse

nibble and run

from frightened dust mites

the tongues that shield and shadow

an eerie memory from boyhood

a parchment night, amber

the color of the aged paper moon

copper beneath dresser drawers

only the trolls discover

rust left the boot heel stiffer.

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“Film Project”

7 Jan

“Film Project”

When marigolds cover a snowy grave.

When distance laps the waves,

the oars we towed away,

the tangled memories shellacked and spackled,

will you cut the tears away, my eyes?

Misery fumes the duchess.

I am hippopotamus desires.

A finger-wrestling match against yourself

in the cantaloupe of night

blind line-dancing

bullet vest, crude choices

through the jungle

fly the wings of this story

her shriveled body

wrapped in grape leaves

arrives from the future

to impregnate the past

crying thousand-eyed stares

spaghetti straps, tortured doves,

fresh yellow jackets

in the bathroom stalls

where you dressed for you.

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“Cracked Bunny”

5 Jan

“Cracked Bunny”

I don’t want to be part of your club anymore.

You let me down.

Hard.

Slow.

Walk with me, hand-in-hand, the stages of your life.

All’s well when you were a rat-tailed child,

your femur tail extending.

In any event, even hands,

climb from the bottom of the bottle,

iron-will clad attitude,

intrepid wanderer

through the ceiling of the hayloft

blows this record from the shelf

however much you blush the daises longing

because pewter is the only rhyme that stings

as you come alone

with a knife on a dark drawbridge

this isn’t any winter

and you’re the first person I haven’t tripped,

poisoned,

or met. Have you?

Stronger and stranger,

glasses of smoky whine

accompany the ram’s horns.

What? Don’t you love poison?

Then whisper a black widow,

accompany me

behind the piano keys.

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“Clues”

4 Jan

“Clues”

You move away.

Hover on the horizon.

Drift how wood.

Bacteria to bacteria,

a glove full of fly eggs,

back to backbone,

let me glide to your velvet

aired-out in everglades

deep freezing meat

in the eye of a crocodile

the crowbar of a profile.

Queen of silent sorrow,

please be sullen to the end of rug burns, sizzling spring legs

sprung frames, the club jesters

rowing off to natural parks,

in the armor of a Minotaur,

on the armoire of a horny princess’s

hoar-frost, the killer of toad skin,

or dry off, your golden body

cooking on a wooden raft

true tales were never left unfastened

heartbeat me through the strips

mummy’s are made to magic

just as flesh-eating cannibals

will light a shot

burning through the ether reality

tantalizing skeletons

from their humorous

backstabbing cages

the porthole porpoise knows

you never really lit a flame

to get better

half the dungeon’s all enraged

without us.

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Patient Victim

4 Jan

“Patient Victim”

Somebody’s shoebox overflows

with warm milk.

Somebody’s warm milk

is discarded without prejudice,

but the garbage man rides

along the crooked fox fence posts.

Somebody’s warm lifeline

hovers above us

blistering a chronic

zero clue

hold my hand above the frozen waterfall

to cool clam your nerves

I called 500 doctors

leaving messages

cat’s paws, voodoo dolls,

bundles of sticks

dinner table folds to match books,

showrooms, unusual wigs and glitter

a murder took place in this very hotel

spiteful rays of sunshine

fish hooks, life elastic

ghosts bubbling in the frothy distance

ruse outweighs the southern stars

spitfire of the snake tattoo

and spilt ants

wrestle in a love-lorn toboggan

this smile leaks past

your frosty fingertips

we afford to stay a day behind

fork over your hunting knife

and all those beastly hearts.

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“Spoiled Promises in the Fridge”

2 Jan

“Spoiled Promises in the Fridge”

When nobody wrote.

“Give me a Sasquatch.”

My drool evades the bar,

a fiery drool

serpentine patterns.

I ask a disease to dance,

but she disappears in the jukebox.

My juicebox takes hold, full,

and delivers me to another planet

before my crime is discovered.

Let me borrow yours anymore,

my sister of the diving dolphins

calls to me anymore on rose bones

to pretend you have no one

to be someone new in an old town

we’re so sorry to inform you

forgiveness in shallow graves

turn around come alive,

to the stitching of guns

wash whistle wolf restraint

cough up the cuff links, spark your pants

the man from powder blue lives in your house

took over your old life now

spent the night coloring a new rash

the color of wounded starfish

however much I love you

while cutting holes through the dishes

the color of cornfield rain

mistletoes the color of buttercups

tumbling through the barley with you

the horse neighs, the collector calls:

you wore his ruby red slippers

to the masquerade ball

and all you did was dance

with a fortune teller’s crystal balls.

Haven’t you any pity?

Here’s a regret to call you late at night:

you: a half-chain of rattlesnake belt

rotten you purr, rototiller

to live scarecrow

the car that drove itself

down the wrong highway.

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