the birds
they are a
murmuring
and the sun
it is a setting
slow across and
into the lowly
horizon
do not despair
the time lost
do not despair
the imperfections
of our attempts
the world slides
past beneath a
reluctant sky
these are mountains
that we’ve built
a gaucherie
in envy of the ruins
left for us
misled assayers
dreaming back
to a former glory
these are mountains
of nothing
we are an
anachronism
not fit for this place

the ropes are coarse
thistly upon thy
nape

the night moans
and the ground palpitates,
doughty!
those places you won't be.
you can't be.
now the walls
in this billet bombinate.
so lay low toward
your suffering and
its easements.
in this tiny droning room,
reeking of tar and soot,
with its jittering, jumping light,
we supplicants
transcend in
through the flames.

the light without
has gone
incandescent, green.
the leaves have
all turned
up and over.
belaud the
templed clouds,
falling.
our breath
shortened within.
south became
north
and the world
started to
drown.

you are fierce
and full of
courage,
your heart swells
like the last
wolf
in a smoldering
forest
with nothing
left to
eat.

first they came
and took my
tail and then
they took the horns.
they clipped
my wings and came
for the fangs.
they returned once
again and pierced
my eyes and
removed my forked
tongue, peeled
the fur and scales.
i allowed them
to do it,
complicit in the
dismemberment.
because every time
they paid their visits
the horizons behind
and above their
mountainous shoulders
- scarlet, bright,
and on fire.
- the skies above
deadest of blacks
and raining pitch.

in this world
i get lost
inside
the nuanced
increments.
beneath the
projected ennui.
in the subtle
shift of
light
or the granular
dissolution of
a captured
sound.
i dwell in
those things
dismissed.
assumed
to all look
and sound
the same.
mesmerized by
the infinitesimal
multifarious
diffusions.
it's an attempt
at completion
a naive urge
to absolute
fulfillment.

what is this that
you are after?
i’ve lain with the
rotting, salivating
dogs in this
lousy bed
of nails and
glass.
who, bay
protests at
my intrusions,
snarl at
my nape, and
the injustice
of this occupation.
so you’ve kicked
the thorns
through my
side.
the stench from
those festering
wounds reeks
of burnt rubber.
i hold out my arms
and try to
see inside of here,
this lowly station.
try to fit
into your
throttlehold.
i’m stumbling
with knives at
my brain,
knives at my throat.
i choke down
the panic
and blood.
you force my eyes open
and black smoke
pours out.
you mention the
suicides and their
unending chains,
and i still
manage to feel
ashamed.

this crisis is
just like that one.
a routine of epochs.

it raises the hair
on the arm and
neck. it chills the
room. it breaks
the neck and back.
it stiffens the marrow.

it follows a trail,
the trail
of wounded
knees
and tears.

it is a march,
unending, beyond the
trees and plains.
into and through
exhaustion. beyond the
end of this world and
the end of
all their worlds.

it is a death
a death that keeps
on giving
into all the
generations.
into the rivers
and valleys,
into all those amber
golden, godless
sunsets.

i keep falling
in over and over
even though
i'm expected to
be someone else
and do something
else
something less idle
i have shaken
the devil's hand
and perhaps
forsaken my soul
and now
i feel i'm owed
and for that
feeling i'm choked
with and by guilt
i lose my grip
almost every
sunday evening
my chest heaves
and crumples
and heaves again
a little weaker
a little shorter
a little shallower
i present these things
i concoct to your
blind ears and eyes
i strive to break
your heart to see
the tears and the
blood bubble and flow
but all you do
is laugh and smirk
rolling your eyes
and sighing
exasperatedly
grow up, you mutter
be less strange
you wish

on the way home
i saw two buzzards
eating a cat
cold and wet
a crushing of
the spirits
let us commence
in the abandoning
of all hope

i am the last burning
tree in the forest
i am equanimity turned
to pitch and tar
i am the minutiae of
the incremental shift
for these are not ghosts
these are just things
left undone
in this short and
indivisible interval
allotted to that
burning synapse
that constitutes
the i in this and
all other reveries

the shadows
lengthen from the
stygian corner
to my outstretched
hand reposed,
between the
jaws of
the wolf,
delicately on its
quivering tongue
with fangs
clinking and
gleaming,
slavering with
devastation and
with this and
in this
salivating sickness
i scour the
heavens and the
depths in that
forever disconsolate
light to clip
the devil's antlers
to wail and beseech.
but nay!

he will not
lay them aside.

i hear the ghosts of trees,
of this and
that world dissolving
into the night.
in the whispering darkness
the lights click on
humming and buzzing with
the blue electric arc
they shine for
no one,
now,
they shine on
no thing.

this is
the one,
until the next one.

in a field
of wild flowers
emblazoned in
white
violets and
pale golds,
all with names
but i do not
know them,
beneath the
rumbling clouds
and thunderous
winds they whisper
to me - how
is it
that
you
are still
standing? -
and we crane
and scan the
darkened dome
above us for
just a single ray
- a single one -
of pure and smiling
light to pink
the caliginous
gloom. gasping
at the threatening
darkness while
the bones of
our soi disant
saints
and kings
liquefy to
spite
and pitch.

and in the glow
of the easy
and pure -
you will forget
the words of
things -
catching the dust
of stars
and suns in your
swimming eyes

the fix
is in.
was in.
the scheme
worked out
way before
you learned
sit up
and gaze,
learned
to punch
a clock
or discern things
decent and indecent.
surrender the
remnants.
dance without
rhythm or joy.
rending a heart
with feigned
tragedy and
a slow
but persistent
dissolution.
this we've come
to call
iniquity,
measured and
recorded throughout
millennia.

they lie there,
some scattered,
some stacked neatly
waiting and fading
from memory
the promises
and responsibilities
self inflicted and
imposed,
competing with
the more real ones.
they require courage
and demand attention,
a daedal mastery
of the hand, heart,
and brain.
they bare their teeth
in anger
and frustration
they demand to know,
in pre dawn hours,
why it is that they
are there, ignored.
and in response
to your unsatisfactory
answer, they break
your heart.

tonight i slept
and while sleeping
i dreamt
and while dreaming
i felt and ideated
i was forgiven.
it was a dream
usurping actuality,
pure and enormous
in its suasion.

alack, I awoke
with a sudden
start and for no
good reason
into the consummation
that indeed I was
not forgiven
but rather
forgotten.

in madness
i am chasing,
chasing,
chasing you
or something
like you.
forlorn and
devoid of
hope. i've
eradicated
the sleep
from my nights
in an effort
to gain on you,
on it,
on them.
but all that
has done is
shortened
my days
and filled
them with
stubby little
hours,
shaken and
dirty and
amounting to
not much
of anything.

in those
late hours
of night
when that
sound deep
in my skull,
vivid,
crisp,
and precise,
of splintering
bone
reverberates,
cascading down
the spine

i swear
it is like
ancient forests
falling down.
like mountains
giving up
and sliding
down into
the seas.