state of grace
) he is mad but wont say. sings
out of the side of his mouth. far-flung, synaesthetic… dogwoods sway, among rainraked weeds. today’s god rises, his long eyes flecked with clouds. gaudy false poinsettas cheer. a snake or an angel looks back— laughing, wet loose… (a wire, or a knife sunk in red dirt) (is really saying no) ... you open your throat.
you lean forward, concentrate.
) chemistry, he says—
fierce bells scream against a bent stalk question backbone. catfish gape from the grave. somewhere
mark
an angel wing (a thought in your moving dream or the still house. blood blows from the stems of air lilies, black skin of close trees spreading the dream wavers, there in the lighteating leaves. meanwhile a twig begins to bleed. electricity hums in your fine arm hairs. you have fallen in the roadcut, like pollen big birds in the ripe corn sing… were you cold he says
scrawl he says/
pretty thing under sap
) on the stalk of an instant,
unpetal. violet drizzle; wet buttocks; heapedup jewelweed. the delicate fin of a bewildered fish. where the fireworks leave off: mosquitoes resume. a mutt tethered to a leafless trunk. Christ is turned back remains/ turned. a cock crows. cicadas churn cemetery flowers. a god with too many arms & then one without any has his way with a girl.
your sunburnt human pirouettes—
) but to submit to articulation
the weeds are singing. next to the lutheran church, a motorcycle splutters. clouds scud tree spine. the world wavers, spilling memories. the wind is like a train/ sparrow twitters.
over violets. a
with a wave of his broken rib entering your blood forlorn crosshatched boomerang knowing/
knowing/
knowing the corn leans right, limbs left.
each foot marries forward, fall—
) & if you do nothing/
on your white chair deciding if tomorrow will start on the left/
or the right hand
of god: green fire makes a parabola, licks the cat velvet sky. wellwater pours from a stone dolphin. the birds & their little psalms scatter in their saintcoloured clothes, sunflowers choke statues. flower music inside burnt rubber. a catjoy clawsharpening. cornfield testaments of the unwrapped dead. listen. even this will be taken from you finally,
as all lies are…
) the low sky rained, & the sparkling
blue birds across morning glories & turnips. in a beautiful allegory he says—shines/ knuckles of your spine. every meaning/ the last witness— once he says you were so in love you/ know what it was…. without knowledge
a peach, before the time.
down the
he says will be reversed until
didn’t later/ (where once
) clarity of fall. or clarity of slash
the riddle was: mountain saucers on a black & white television. clouds of cowflesh. mind magnolias. small birds elegant/ on a white plate. one self he insists is not/ live.
the way to
you go on your orphan feet making perfect/
euclidian
chalkshapes. some of the houses all in a row are stuck together no space between them. black fish flowers follow the high/ prairie sky. carefully
you spread/
your wings & try—
) like the giant stones of macchu picchu
combines dance with daffodils orions belt crocuses bartalk, birdsong. a beckett tree punctuates the blinding/ sin trembles through thin wires: smoldering, unreadable. a butterfly spills out of radio. in the watery globe, makes tornwhite words. from the vast fields, strange angels, backward flying birds. ruth/
amid the alien corn.
the stark flat miracle:
all syntax, in the syllables.
green.
) begin again
dusk parcels out tree roof highway, a flight of spotted turkeys, fleshly warbling clouds. your distorted bodies approach the road curling left, eye cutting right. the grass stirs. a sparrow sings. the first beast makes its entrance without etiquette or influence other than this green hunger— the treeline wavers like something proposed then forgotten: while the jaguar of sweet laughter, thrashing itself out among the glorious unstrung light of June—
holy ghost (where does it come from this/ desire