stark, talon'd invasive
a habit of hard flight
direct headed, gregarious

borrowed speech
pattern of alarm
Starling shows monger how to listen

lilting neighbor followed, following
a cloud; chattering congregation clattering
the body moves but the mind is unchanged

Atramentous

I should have written love letters all along
I was loath to leave
instead, spelling out what was not wanted in silence.
and so I lost my voice ---
content to seek an accuracy I would want
to speak
or at least understand
within myself

an outline around my form where there should be none
and I am the blank page babbled upon
scrawl rewritten in name of what I have not done
I am the last drop of ink spread thin, desperate.

What were those words that I tried to remember?
the Lexis muttered upon my tongue turns it heavy
It struck hard; a violent chord within my throat.
It made me; it sounded me out like the vowels of a howl.

old oil lamp light smolders slow to keep warmth inclusive of the lonely night
morning hours are bided in time

I am the Wheel

when the Day-Dog doubles over in holler
the sunrise is a taut lie
supplied upon an old sky to make fire

What is the present when it is always the past?

a stone skipping down the well and all left is broad stroked Echo
never breathing in the moment
by no means here
or now
but recounting past selves in the down deep divide; what was action and what was mistake
when
retrospection upsets, there is fault to be unearthed
and it was all yours
glorified and shorn
to make room for more

We are told it is all for Naught

i am just bones

page wrapped

scratched patchwork

paper thick

pitch ink

tongue speaking tongues

dipped quill tip deep; leaving a void

invade the soft parts of fingers, a long spine

like the summer sun in iris,

or hand placed firm,

matted mane, wet, lay long in the lost crevice between shoulder blades.

Voices wisp; curled to hide in deep sung verses from Mouth making new shapes.

People look ugly when they cry
taking the moment to look in the mirror
and reaffirm the fact -- and we were born hideous --
silently making love, watching whispering fingers on your lip, somatic Braille spelling
“now can you see”

Cassandra roped to the rocks
she was assaulted by snakes licking ears clean
eyes sown open because someone doesn’t know how to talk to girls
she will see the world’s end as it comes
out from her mouth, chaotic, and into the endless wonder of
“no, you are the liar”

A need to be violent
when mongrel switch flips and we are hunched, lurching, it comes quick like winter winds before the leaves start to die, like the Blue Jay becomes terror amongst emerald prisons, wardens of the wild brush, whistling through a barely open beak
“which voice should we listen to”

Waking with the moon in the noonday glow,
it clears a path through dust and celestial dynasty
counting senescent stars that needed to be named
finding the oldest; I lent the last name given to me and knew it would suffice
as it collapsed upon itself.

I lit a cigarette at the wrong end and smoked it half way
stubbed dead ash upon palms to smear long letters on a wall
unafraid of the wayward wind and letting go of change
tending noticed glances and half smiles set loose
made sure they were counted for
board up in the whole silence of sacred solitude
nourished, licking fingers slogged with ink
spitting up unhurried cursive in the exhale
in the frail consciousness of waking breath
the length of the larynx distends
the wind bending the sigh
exhaling a ghost
still husk

when I die I’ll be closer to god because I won’t exist

Doggerel

Here is strewn tangle:

Tell what words mean to me
scale placed with tender touch
or haphazard hand to make sure of balance
right, regardless
give speculation so I can be prosperous
cash in rhymes to buy more vowels

cast about, jumping ship to get the bends out
shake the host to leave a ghost in place

strip the Bone to Boddhi
breath in tandem with the trees

benefit from vibration
absorb denotation

sketch the unlit corner sitting dim in the back of unfettered thought
stretch ink thin to get every last uncertainty out
make the body something of value
so I can waste myself in petty street spending
change handing to wordless and wanting until I stand empty handed

First Breath like the smoke of fire from newspaper clips and bad bibles
a “thank you” read in short hand

simple sanguine notes of re-steps crawled up through my spine; we ask for reasons for time spent sifting sand through a convex hourglass

the Ocean says
i am right
how the waves sway back and forth
it begs
i tried

soft as night, broken in two
a widow fights for some sign of time

days off the calendar,
months, aren’t quite as accurate
to remember, like lines of conversation
mumbled quiet in desperation

Sing of a cold autumn afternoon,
Sparrows flight seemed much too soon

Uncertain what these hands should do,
idle by and forget what’s new

bloodletting to bear the spirit

glance last like reflections in mirrors
that look away as you open your eyes

time and tide stretch like hands that reach down and through my veins.

The self; empty space at a center of a star
distance from limb end to end
soul sliver; remains in sonorous sleep
dismissed notice
fragmentary variance cast across Cosma
familiar final fate
infinite distance between insides
expands the ending of empty
meets open all; an assemblage of hawks holler

further existence upon ever vista, tilted universe
fast pulling undiscovered way
impulse of emotion ephemeral
thousand-fold flowering; wringing memory
colossal complete conscious
absence is all we can affirm
sad self’s silent passing
fear and hope bellow, a low murmur
bended tree recovers from the heavy wind
when we cease to be -- become more, then we were once
word spoken to carry the weight of the world
my mother is the flame lighting the end of existence

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain

a machination of things to be forgotten
a past self; conscious future stock
a mottled mask made for daily wear
a host to test the metal
broad strokes on tin
with a full arm
with a haggard pace
with a chest huffed
with king cowardice
with a mind full
grant solid wishes

Bear no resemblance to who used to live in a flat and settled land

sipping ink, staring coarse, locusts bloom at slow noon, sundown, blissful content, what wants worries what a sorry waste what bad fate those black teeth that sorrow that grief.

climb from root to fence to roof
cull quick with a craned nape
bottom beak jaw reaching down
sing more softly in the quiet dark
the low wind is a collective call
furtive and found in the wrong bough
build another nest for the sun
to pass the time besides hunting late
neck cricked to the side in game
two talon around the branch that holds tomorrow’s home
glide in sightless to the black and the back porch that leads to the ravine and the river

Wolves’ teeth instead of my own
and I can taste the last words they spoke

I fill pockets with stone and wade into the river
wait for the current to take me into the forest
to become lost in the arms of wild wood

demanding the rights of an old elm
possession of skin that moves makes me king
and it at once becomes bare branched
and air becomes poison

but my grizzle-gut holds spirits from last winter
ones white with the snow
blind and invisible
the horizon continued into the sky
there was no need for words like “where”

Bonetree

standing at the ends of branches and
falling feet first from the Bonetree
bringing down the clouds
plucking the moon’s thin grin
pulling the corners of the night sky
to fashion a new hide
lucid and everywhere
until I become that grand vista
forever stretching my arms out
moving everything further apart
defining an edge of existence for the dead to walk upon
in the hopes that they’ll leave me alone
and maybe then I’ll enjoy the quiet

gathering sticks behind grandmother’s house
to kindle my pyre

what does it mean
when it’s cold only in my room,
dead flies in the middle of January,
a mouth only moans,
veins mark a map

still a little lost

out where the trees touch the top of the sky
a stuttered gasp is shared between you and I
it fills our chest and we deep breathe because they tell us it’s good
we’ll be content with land razed, decay and soot

Out where waves fall off the end of the ocean
A common word was shared between you and I
flowed out through tongues and consumed heart and mind
I wish on fallen eyelash that floats the current of your exhale

Out where the wind runs out its lungs
a senseless grasp is shared between you and I
It won’t fulfill our bones, it saps and moans the soul
fragile patterns mocking hands turning cold

a grand twisted stranger bending in time

with the wind, jagged gnashing, grind and whistle

silver edged glass rings sway in time

Silo singing, hollowed and obeisance against the gale

soft wail tip toeing on the tail of a sigh

Little Whisper, a resonance, leaping low noise

perhaps Mourning Mother

perhaps Lost Love

a whistle in the wind;

a wind withering wounds

To be Defeater

I wish I breathed at the start of the flat sea
endeavor upon the steady ending ocean

and wait for the fall of the horizon

what would we expect
an edge to stop upon
lean over and let stones fall
for the resounding of the bottomed out deep

we would hug waters as we go over the edge
find ourselves on the southern side of existence
explore underneath-earth
meet mirrored selves and their own sun
they, enamored by old bravery
sails striding new air

we would be written down as fable and then history
for the rest of man joined fain

new cities stood with our names
as we fought amongst for the last land

we will climb a beast with roots for limbs

sticking fingers deep into blackened bark, pull out sticky sweet

tasting thick nectar as we share a staggered breath

carved steps from stone, each taller than the next
regardless of even footholds, even progress
through
and thoroughly
there with me

a long way up

fingers chapped, white dry, snapping

my love ties double knots around her waist

a picture of a meek word spoken
as if rhymed with anything

teeth become sharpened on rocks; they grate together
sing a song written in two parts

like a willow sprouting full grown into a cold night in May
arms become branches
feeling the ground for warmth

Plague Abandonment

staid upon a precipice, an abyss
overlooking
peaceable and meek motioned
cloven hoof footed
whatever willed
the fill of sitting still
feet planted deep
making me feel some kind of way

vagabonding sneak
only come quiet
only coming clean
what does not kill you makes you wish it had

Spend your time in, the sky bleeds goodnight; the touch of two palms together turns the clouds inside out. So soft, so soft it goes, the trepid bridge we cross, it moans, we sway with the rhythm of the river, so that it splinters in two from the burden we bought. You have been defined. A sordid so and so, slipping through paper walls to seek out the hands of a clock; you’ll set it back a minute and explain why in vowels. I wash my hands of all this, and water soaks and drips from the walls as my silent sigh trembles and shakes these limbs dry. I’m one for taking it hard, I’m one to worry about, I’ll ask for regrets and stories unclouded by doubt. We’ll sit watching quietly. We’ll plead for the sun not to come, as we take the long way around our problems and drown them in smoke and bones. I hear that winter is here and I lock the doors, afraid of the loneliness that is the frozen contort of a land lost in a grey storm, a dead home. Too soon it seems, leaves swept from the streets, drown the sheen of snow melted from the march of feet.

Will not wants wail when needed, bleeding slow along long laments, howling wild now, in lanterns, above the whispering night lights warm, deep bronze, but sometimes tawny when the fog bends, magnifying mists journeyed, brooding, downcast thick little atmosphere, shuddering hollow cloud, round out, wound down, holy world, whole whirl, air admitted, sweet like love, flowers blooming, cherry blossom, lofty ghosts lonesome in the hall when my room is locked tight, silent in the blight, where, waiting in vain, hearts will beat fast and then not at all.

Calling for someone who knows the ins and outs of the city sewers in the winter mornings. I know the way to our underground Shambhalah but I get lost in the forlorn dark. I’m lonely you see, a solid thing, someone to go missing with. Laying breadcrumbs to feed senseless beasts, to map a new way home. Scratch your name in the guardrails of the freeway around the city. I’ll leave street names in love songs on the radio. I’ll write the way in riddles to find where we’ll meet.

Tell me about the old days,
“We went through a forest turning to flames, burning up the sea, in hue the leaves grew hot, fell free from branches twisted wide and reaching to hold up the clouds, become the mast, steady, a fragile embrace we have of these waves, the sweet breath of winter sifted sank the sails along the curve of crescent moon, and wind gathered, the tide was a thing to forget, we knew not what we sought, only that we were looking, little and lost, we became a storm over a calm sea, a wisp, an effervesce, as the wreck we splinter, abandoned by the mast and the bow, churned by a terrible sway, amen, amen, oh help us lord, oh save our souls.”

When I was young I used to pray for the rain, but I realized that god doesn’t work that way and so stole every last drop from heaven and prayed for forgiveness. I left them out to dry on the black pitch; the day slow towed them away, and I could not help but hold my arms out, palms down to catch passing spirit’s unhurried amalgamation in the sky. Closing hands into a hollow fist, I whispered names across the space, and they echoed in the distance between identity tight printed in lines prescribing destiny and devotion to a faraway star.

I never felt the pull of celestial bodies
They never told me of what I should dream
the most I could hear was that I was bad and broken
Something unclean to be washed away in flames

So what if I’m the only one made of matter
and nothing else makes sense except in my mind
could there really be a watchdog we’re warned of
could we be on our own, blind

And my mother reminds us that all the world is haunted

There are good ghosts and bad ghosts and it is just chance

They sense you like a sifter moving through sand to find
shimmers breaking apart the sun smiling down

They find you like the swallow finds home, whistling in the wind,
and when they catch their song swift sung back on a better breeze their direction is steadfast

They know you like old words
recited and written differently,
a hastily played Chinese Whispers, quietly,
secretly in the dark.

I hear their hello grow soft down the hallway  ---

Syncopated

to their own beat

She sang hallelujah as she inhaled
smoldering sun
and became a hallowed mother
you can see her insides glow with the embers of the noon

My limbs are weary when we’re done
pounding fists into stone
we’ll mend all

Crow Bone Crown

batten down
worn out sound
air is inflexible mass
cornered
barred in
steady pace made to last
trepid jaw gnaws skin strip clean
ivory sings in heat gleam
held back morning’s fleet footed leave
maintain missed memory
sea lost walkabout
get the bends down
settle crown
full of hell
coming up
making moves wound
speak blood
croon old tunes
staking for the blame
keep the solid frame
take
taste pain
hold hope
sustain maimed claims
remain the same
carry on

King Crow, King Bones

exhaustion of easy life
stifled from the loose leash
breaking promises because it makes mother shake her head
but she understands
she told me so
so I would know
I don’t have to stop my bad habits
skin tight bare bones act
carbon custody
whiskey sigh
weaving tall tales in the low light, early morning
laying hard
bending in the black roof
take whatever talk is about and loud
gather it tight as wrapped tinder
whisper it back through the filter and smoke, out into dim dawn.

how to identify your worth under the earth
comprehensive liability is the stock locked
little white slip lets me be saved foremost
safe embrace in the hefting arms of grace
when death moves slow it broaches
how to apply yourself to reap

I lay with love
on the anniversary of other love
hot heaving in autumn heat
laying of palms
ours is quiet sin

bites at neck
makes eyes
through and into freely
thorough gaze

ramparts and wayward stratosphere head highs
she is wings; I am wide horizon
she is deep cloud; I am thin air
gasping but steadfast and head on
upon the curve of atmosphere and exhale

bad love
but just
deserved
rationalized
coerced foreign tongues
we better together
dedicated  love in language
soft smolder, emerald irides, dusk glow
hands within hands
intwined
entwined
vine like
wild-weaved
time together has us tied up tight together

Skylark light, shine bright
take your sweet song

Raven’s wing, soft silent king
rip a tune from my tongue

Doves white, sink the sun’s flight
teach me sad songs

Sparrow calm, long hallelujah
hallelujah from a psalm

Nocebo
    "I will harm" -a.d.
 
waste no soma on the walking dead
Hungry Husk hobble

gently afflicted
without placing hands

Old Word
Evil Eye
Gnarled Limb

White wailing dunes
torrid pigment derived from bone
tea leaves
smoke trails

sibilating --
“you will die soon and there is nothing anyone can do about it”

Body gives into Belief 
Belief gives:

Bad Blood
breaks bones

Roll over holy scarlet hoister of light

Holy rolling

Jubilate denizen amongst woven machinations
riding thick wind over black tides
Eyes ever orbed outward
Watchful brother of oldest father
singing a silent note through steadfast leer
Story maker of the turmoiled crashing coast
Lost god of the most ghosts
cradles softly within maw’s bottom jaw
the seawater swamp forests of elder Indonesia, bahasa
He enunciates words with no sound

Speaking the radiance of the sun in each syllable
as the Great Lion pardons the thoughtful thinker murmuring familiar dreams he has

yet to finish

Medicine-Man drums thunder, holy apparatus, deerskin stretched taut,
he has become the all blue cloudless sky, faded as the plotted land he is scrawled upon.

Atop his turtle mount, it takes a step with each change of the season, his destination is the other side of creation, keeping time, his rhythm wills the turning of the cosmos, churning the spirits of old gods to mark luminous messengers on a star chart, to create legless sparrows flying around this celestial form, swirling the terrible sublime on a silent night.

He shapes the moon within his center, commanding the tide with each breathe
inwards -- outwards.

Donner Party

I should curtail this appetite

drunk on the tepid night
dead vine holds under white steel awning
moon has taken to woes
breathing out to breath in smoke
so the note holds
or the end comes slow
but sure

build me a fire to be warm for the night
set me on fire to be warm the rest of my life

Sweet Jesus Girl,

wishing me well “Jesus Christ loves you” waltzing back alleys of 9th street.

for all hours shy shoulders crouched

facing the sides of houses lost stop thoughts

before deciding a better way to wander-sneaking up in the dark night saying

“God bless you God Jesus loves you”and not knowing who said it

I believed god stood at my back

willed me wanting with a soundless prayer her breath;

the soft steady confirmation of scopophobia

I did not recognize her today

and when she first called me God’s child

I had not heard

and so stopped to listen to her holy cadence
bible verses from rote
side notes in the margins, Jesus-rote, quiet note
nodding thanks I walked away without a word and felt cold gold around my neck

later, in the car heading home I saw her behind the neighbor’s shed nitpicking at her blue jean dress, slow step through the alley to face grey chain links, then walk north, in pilgrimage

across the highway and the rest of Kansas

i feel it back again
a spirit beckoning
the melody she weeps becomes the voice in my head

i am alone
sleeping on my mother’s bones
until she decides to come home

despair about old life
tame a holy ghost
spread wide and fly mild
tend to not mind
take time like a fast tide
receive peace clean
spring sun and moon brine
biding mine for wanting what is not
hiding kind to make the mark stick
bury our dead seated

Mother frets; my bed faces the doorway
says I am openly inviting Skipton, poor soul, into my room

impatient twenty-three year old stuck on Iowa st.
in a heavy rush
rode his motorcycle into oncoming traffic last year
black tarp: a horizon crossing lanes

air moves as a wall when a door is opened
host of heavy hands lay down upon shoulders and back.
As I lose my head to silent sleep, from the closet door, opened just an inch, Skipton mutters in, “Ohm”, and it echoes, becoming a chant in the still space above my bed

Shadows of fingers on the outside edge of my stubborn window, glass void of night frost, warmed by the heat of lingering grip. For days now I’ve been looking to the left,
expecting a shade in the doorway, or fingers over wooden edges, slowly closing the closet door

Rustled from loose sleep, I thought a friend, coy and sneaking, came into my room and displaced pressure and placed hand on my ankle hanging the edge, and gently pressed it down into the mattress and with a startled twist I turned and the room was empty and the door was shut, Skipton, poor stuck soul, had snuck up on me as I napped in the cool noon of late fall

He tries to get my attention when noise envelopes my ears, “Hey” he whispers, “You listening?” from the back, behind, and chills sprint down the rivets of my curved spine

is the sound of a

ringing wind chime

will create as speak

unturning line cuts the front door

most high holy ghost

secret serpent coiled in spring, whispers silent things

like who survives the lion hunt

fingers locked in forgotten sign language

winged globe, steady dissipation

a locket of burnt birch, warm in palm

carved haze of bone dust

something to believe in

He sits a silent cipher

Thumb heavy, a pearl of hashish sat smoking on its tip. He sips light of the stone and becomes holy mountain, A proverb mentioning the middle and the end of dear creation etched in the feathers of a white-eye. He counts the days with the teeth of leviathan, long sinewy things, they chatter together, spelling new words for an old language. His throat is the skin of the land, a coarse road drawn by all the horses of his time, and as he speaks, stars flicker and close their eyes in the night sky; cold wax cakes the candle, drowning the wick in a thick malaise.

give me my antlers and I’ll give up my ghost
bare bones
strip skin, little teeth
open up
have a mess to clean

my mind is a crowed moon
waning in the day

separation of a

moth in flight
smoke trail
endless inhale

Summer’s end hosts:
cloud columns at night
head bowed in tempest
take rest when steady motions sets
forms
peace made
maintained

often erroneous still frame
flayed maimed and blamed
a body to make the motions mend
living in
a body haunted
with ghost hope
motley mourning wanes

A house of birds is my name
eating wings to make me tame