Comes Around

Sometimes I like to think,
as Cash tucked his black shirt
into his leather belt and black pants and
shined the toe of his boot
with a little spit and a rag,
that he had me in mind,
fingers on his machine head,
in my self important moments
walking the long hill home and
palms grayer than the morning,
covered thick with aluminum dust and
sweat slurried grains of floor tile.

Anorexic Chef

The preparation of food is a joy
in a vein similar to
what a commando must feel
studying and dissecting
the ways and wiles and customs of
an enemy's indigenous population
before a twilight operation
aimed at extermination.

Twiddle

It only took five years
to figure out
the opportunity of my life
to date
in bedding you did not
meter out
into a fruitful relationship
mainly because
what I saw as a chance to
fuck my way
into your heart forever was really
no more than
the satiation of morbid, passing,
curiosity harbored
for any unexplained and smoking wreckage
you came across
except there was nothing worth noting inside
my black box,
but, I am glad that at least you took
lots of pictures
because a disaster without thoughtful
documentation
is a waste of the precious stuff
of being.

That I've Met You

Where goes and is
gone to the streams and stones and fish
drops of orange and black candle wax
in aqueous flight
darting to and gone in a
blink without aperture and f stop.

There lies the remains of a day,
a week, lost to understatement and understanding
unrealized and what I've wanted
to show you
in the longest hours of my life
I cannot give paint to

and instead will
no more seek to give movement
to the atom and spring and vibrancy
latent and whispering
cool lipped to the hairs
at the nape of my neck so caught.

You've known the thrill of trickling thoughts
winding electric in the lossy.
Winding blind and static
before the touch of bathed and water napped
fingertips on the spaces of us
beholden to cotton and ester cloth
in the draining light of day.

I will tell you where I am
because I cannot show you
what I feel inside
the space of a world
beyond the space of seconds
that deign to capture and yield
to the cast net of voice.

Abstract Funk

There is a fascination with the outlay and set of the world,

come spilling through the valley to which I've seat,

in her silver blinking, unclouded, eye and lashes shedding

rays of raindrops like shower beads across and into

the furrows and curves of skin bound

too tightly to shoulders that sink and unwind

like thousand year louvers to a bedroom

in rivers running long and twine like and distorting

into steam heat to rise and press against 

the undersides of her stomach and ribs and chin

and catch in the fine hairs of her forearms 

like breaths of glass and seeds of vision,

that I have.

All A Yall Go

Ready to tear off an afternoon run
in the air dotted with the gray mists of
the ghosts jostled loose from tree tops
stoned ragged by morning hail
I catch up to my steps marking the time
at my front door
like a dog waiting to be taken to the park
and chewing at the edge of my dreams
while I slept.

The clouds overhead are obscure
as I go by four counts over downed branches
and sad faced leaf pieces that want to know
why the day got off so miserably but I
don't have time to talk or read
the fuzzed intent  of shapes out bent
above me and where my dogged feet
are want to go and can I shake
the nights disappointment loose?
The clouds hide behind each other
and heckle out "no"s.

Turning pot hole crater rims and
winter broken sidewalk crimps and
bowls of collected water and road slog
I straighten up and breath it all
inside and take the ghosts
along for the ride until they spin
off my back and to their nests
to chirp and peep and work the branches
in the warming breeze
and the air in me is like
a jar of fireflies
turned loose against a flat black night.

Above me, the clouds are still
a motley crowd, but the trees are coming
together over me and my two four step
and even the puddles are clapping
to the beat between sheets of steam
from the air drying street and the
green of tree tops worked this way and
then that by winds fast forwarded
on summer bird's backs
scrub away the wet blanket of "no"
before the lines break back
in floodlit waves of purple dotted shrubs
red hydrant corners and moss flecked limbs
gripping green and sun fire worked poms
to reveal more sky and pearly blue
than I could swallow if I had a mouth a mile wide
and behind me
off to either side
all the trees go "yeah!"

Hey, Girl

The high today is looking like
I might wear something light
in kind with you and I could ride
to where the streets get wide
and traffic's slow and easy
to peddle laughs and smiles
between icees and frost coffee
and maybe stop by
my favorite spot to lie
beside the freight tracks,
sun in our eyes, and fly
on tangents dyed
green as dandelion bulbs
not yet broken open.

The sunshine is calling, neon signed,
drawing wide and deep blue lines
behind and through my blinds.
The tufted clouds remind
me of the fine edged bite
in plastic cupped white wine
out of doors in your backyard
or mine on a Wednesday
calling for an end
to workday grinds and
buzz blushed conversation,
so how about you
and I go forget why
days have gone by between then
and today's lustered
creamed ice custard sunshine
begging the question
of us two, undefined.