FOR EMILY

To the poet, is possibility 

really so much fairer 

a house in which to dwell 

than prose?

The abstract made tangible 

seems a double-edged sword—

to be liberated, at length,

is to find yourself unmoored 

in a closet-

sized hell

where defining

spells confinement

and the devil presiding grows

bored of the details—but never 

the impregnable strength 

of your rhyming. 

LITTLE CLOUD

Baggy soul, 

vague stray sailing past

in the sky—

how strange it would be

to know 

why you rain;

how frightening 

to comprehend your 

delirious lightning. 

If these memories won't go,

wash their pain, 

immolate me, 

then shade 

as your winds fly the ashes 

that remain.

FANTASY

If I was a billionaire

with the means 

to travel everywhere, 

and I found nothing anywhere—

would I not still

have succeeded? 

Would I not always be lauded 

and remembered 

for allowing 

here and there

to finally coincide?

* 

How about this 

for a fantasy?—

You play the intergalactically

famous conductor 

of the Quantum 

Mechanical Choir and its

Relativity Orchestra, 

and I'll be 

the one-man crowd 

of dark matter

who does not 

applaud—but still pushes 

for an encore.

*

Once again, our

experts are astounded

to find—

the what 

and the how 

are at odds with each other;

the more sincere

we sound

when elucidating one

the more desperate 

we become 

to convince one another.

ELLIPSES

Summer's end 

in the park:

the open mouths 

of now-

exasperated May flowers

still asking—

what good is shape 

to the artist

without color?

Could the length 

of life matter 

more than the impact? 

* 

Given the tendency 

I have to keep 

cropping up 

in sentences,

I have begun 

to suspect 

I can 

out-quip

my own death.

*

For every toss 

that just feels wrong, 

there comes 

a semi-

righteous turn—

a neutron 

drips radiation, 

converts 

to a proton; 

you squirm 

in your dreams, 

as if trying 

to escape them, 

but always

relate them 

in first-

person narration.

ACCEPTANCE SPEECH

After all the thick music 

and the bleak 

diary entries,

after Nobel prizes 

and analyses 

are accepted—

isn't a poem just 

a little machine:

a firework 

which displays

(in the flair of its plume)

one frame 

of a dream? 

Is it not a we

divided by me—

a body on a page

stalked offstage 

by a concept?

Or, shall we make it

even easier to defend 

and claim it's 

more like a novel 

with everything 

but the intensest feelings 

wrung out of it—

until all that's left 

is a curious pulp 

that molds

in our grip 

to the shape 

of deep silence?

INQUEST

It's been said 

that the soul 

is shaped by its seclusion,

its desire for

tight junctures, its fetish 

for their rigor—

as such, it has commanded  

you too

to be stiff;

it has bid you to insist 

on silence 

in the library 

and coerced you to stick 

to reading classics 

of the literature.

But the truth is, 

this is a bit 

of a misapprehension; 

for whenever you 

look, what you see inside 

is edgeless, 

smooth, 

transparent, 

indivisible—and so, 

the best way 

to truly comprehend it

might be to dirty it, 

rough it up, 

abuse it, call it 

stupid now and then.

Only then, 

when it reddens, 

swells up, and 

begins to accuse you,

may you circuitously 

measure it—

pretending 

all the while, of course,

to keep your soul

at arm's length

and pay it 

no attention.

IF THAN

If there is a place 

where "here" and "there" 

collide, 

what other words 

might have syllables 

in common? 

*

if something is lost 

and then I find it, 

which type of drama

would you now say

is your favorite? 

* 

If the myriad white 

and yellow blossoms,

 

once opened, 

all act as parasols, 

does that mean 

all effort 

is cumulative?

*

if "what" and "how" are two 

dependent variables, 

how do we know 

whether anything 

has 

escaped?

*

if everyone out here 

is "sitting in traffic," 

then there's no such thing as traffic, 

and so—no one 

really is?

RANSOM

Do you remember 

the day when you 

first learned

that the color

and the sound bursts 

which were littered 

all around you

were intended 

as gifts—each of which 

you deserved? 

More importantly, 

what priceless boon

did you gain 

in forgetting

the simple glories 

of that morning?

More than enough, 

one shall assume,

to pay the ransom 

demanded by the 

madness of identity—

to forsake

your handy arms 

and those

efficacious legs, 

and, despite its utility,

to willingly come,

for a time, to be 

stranded 

in your body.

DRIVEN TO ABSTRACTION

I have just decided: 

I don't want to be represented 

anymore—

or dissembled 

or regretted—only 

reflected.

All day, my mind has been 

one of the plants 

in the garden 

which thrust without intent, 

then retreat 

without haste 

as the sun 

moves west 

from east—

their gnarled branches 

and upstart green leaves (forming 

meaningless patterns 

of fractals 

which seem to endless-

ly stutter and repeat)

having thus far managed,

without any basis 

in merit,

to please me 

again. And again.

And again.

OVERSIGHT

To be human, they told us

would be all about 

balance: 

to walk upright 

would steal dignity 

from the belly-crawling class.

Sure enough, 

our particulars 

would soon tend 

toward the over-

determined, 

while their context 

was so delicate, 

it had to be crafted 

from scratch. 

But what nobody mentioned

was that opposites 

attract—

that, at base,

we consisted of 

infinitesimal points,

half of which 

had 

what the other half 

lacked.

(Were we supposed 

to act proud—

or jealous 

of that?)

BY DEFAULT

What would I do 

if I didn't 

need to do 

a thing? 

Would I 

fluctuate 

between magnetic

and electrical 

potential—

between 

dinner and dancing 

and a long- 

distance call? 

Show me a beholder 

with no eye 

to privilege, 

and I'll show you 

a massless particle 

that doesn't rumple space at all.

Ask me: 

what do "self" 

and "it" 

have in common? 

And I'll answer:

how could a self 

not be selfish 

by default?

GOOD POINTS

There's a very real sense 

in which 

stillness comes 

to murder us.

We really don't know 

how much we depend 

on the restless fury 

of all that writhes within us 

until it slows

such that the heat starts 

to go—

and even then...

*

"You don't know 

what you don't know," 

one unfertilized 

egg says 

to another, 

as if suspicion of everything 

was really a way 

to fake this existence 

until it gets 

made.

* 

How do you even know 

if a poem is 

making good points

when each sentence 

is tailor-made 

to slip 

like trick cuffs 

from the wrists of a 

practiced magician 

freeing himself 

for the millionth time 

this month

from the painted-on 

prop cage

of language?

WE'LL JUST HAVE TO WAIT AND SEE

With everything we know 

so far 

we couldn't fill a 

vacuum.

Some maintain  

that nature 

is God's thoughts; 

others, 

that God is nature 

talking.

But whichever the case, 

at least no one argues 

that all the great many 

are made 

in the image 

of something 

that lacks patience

and abhors 

concentration. 

*

Letter by letter, 

I am spelling out 

thank you

with one unbroken cursive 

caress of a pen—

is this the same 

way mangled

roots turn

to hale stems?

Does each

tendril reach 

to receive 

or to bless 

the sun?

NEXT LIFE

Just so we're clear—

you're sure

the stars 

are the barrel fires 

of all our exiled 

ancestors,  

but that language 

is a curse 

that precludes our getting

close?

*

"Poetry always 

says more 

than it means to,"

lectures the YouTuber confidently, 

as if 

we could measure it—

as if meaning came

in units. 

*

If there was another universe 

one address over,

I'd be 

good as gone.

But the doors 

that might lead there

(per the ones 

from my nightmares), 

all look exactly 

alike.

HUMBLE PIE

Near the trash bins

in the alley 

which always overflow

a hundred black ants 

(or maybe more) 

have swarmed 

to the center of a 

brown apple core—

Pathetic, you think, 

how they jones 

for the sugar. 

But what used-up hull

do you consider treasure?

And how much of it

would you throw 

to the beggars 

in order 

to know one scrap 

of their rapport?

RORSCHACH TEST

Some mornings, downtown looks 

more distant 

and half-missing—

not much to see

but two or three obelisks  

which loom 

in the haze like 

somber monuments 

created in the oblique 

likeness of their 

long-extinct builders: 

a race of giant 

men and women 

whose every grand achievement 

was quickened

by its lack 

and who must have been 

wiped off the face 

of this planet 

by the sickness 

of their own ambition 

or perhaps 

its terrible cure—an obsession 

with rest.

THE SHAPE OF THINGS

Unlike Shakespeare's art, 

in life, it was you 

who played the part 

of your own three

weird sister cheerleaders:

from the start, 

you'd seen

how this ends, 

but still egged 

yourself on—as if 

even a ruin 

could be intelligently 

designed.

*

In order to see the future, 

we dress it up 

as the past. 

In an attempt 

to hide the past, 

we stow it safely  

in the future. 

But if time 

is a smooth line 

and not discrete units, 

how do we extenuate 

the blasphemy 

of our

breathing?

*

After the shape 

of things is disclosed,

exposing their seams

is easy.

We remain suspicious 

of everything we can't see 

and afraid 

of the common coldness

of plenty

of the things we can. 

We propose 

a new astrology

to give purpose 

to the stars 

after failing to divine any 

offhand.

CLICHÉ

Yet again, an old tree branch 

has snagged and gored a 

plastic bag.

At first, 

from the ground beneath, 

you can see the two of them 

bend and thurst

and parry in the wind;

but then, 

they seem to marry 

and behave as one system—

an augmented chord  

that just hangs in the air

with no inherent urge 

to resolve, 

or the parent 

who has just captured, and now 

raises up her fretted child,

only to kiss

and forgive.

ACCESS DENIED

The very first 

game 

we learned

how to play 

with ourselves 

would have to 

have been

Peekaboo—then 

Hide-and-Go-

Seek was king—

before it full-

bloomed into 

See Something, 

Say Something. 

*

What do I like best about myself?

My inability 

to take compliments.

You might view this 

as a detriment; 

but I use it 

as a gift-

card 

(which never expires) 

kept safe 

in its wallet but 

not yet 

redeemed. 

*

It is written in the skies 

which we're so keen

to look to

and nod to each other 

and call diamond-

blue

or blood-red 

when it's 

not true:

it's hard to be understood—

even harder to 

be seen.

REMINDERS

1.

I am neither depressed 

nor anxious. 

Depression and anxiety 

merely exist.

Okay—so, I guess

thoughts are just 

having themselves now? 

2.

How is your 

apocalypse going?

In mine, the survivors 

all form a band 

because 

they understand each other 

that much 

better when they

aren't talking.

3.

Life is 

made of particles, 

the physicist says; 

while the novelist 

suggests 

it's more like a premise 

that toys 

with its audience. 

Either way, it's a process 

which has to be observed 

and once it has started,

must not be 

interrupted. 

4.

Does the light 

you can see

at the end of the tunnel 

remind you of the over- 

harsh 

delivery room glare? 

If so, that's 

perfect; there's 

no need to worry.

If this were a dream, 

there would be no 

reminders—

everything there is exactly

as it appears.

NOUMENA

It's true that

we're not willing 

to try very hard 

to see things as they really are,

devoid of their color, 

smell, taste, and texture—

that is, 

enduring 

as pure numbers 

and positions—without us.

Yet, how rigorous—

how hard 

and how long we 

are willing to practice

to perfect 

the ridiculous 

art of our own 

indifference 

to the fact.

*

Dear God, 

where's the pizazz 

in doing all this 

math in your head:

derivatives 

of ribs, 

raised to the power of 

sea and soil;

darkness 

divided by light 

(in parentheses) 

times seven?

Unless 

or until

you spread your lips 

and hold forth,

all phenomena will wither 

still deaf

to the truth,

and its magic 

will be spoiled.

BREATHWORK

Inhale

and behold: not before, 

but behind your very eyes, 

the attention 

is collapsing—

as if 

every thread 

of some fabric 

has unraveled, 

as if empty space 

has been yanked 

down a sinkhole,

a pinhole, 

an infinitesimal 

but unfathomably deep 

black hole—

inside which, 

in a lapse 

lost to time, 

all that nothingness 

gets compressed 

and compounded 

until it explodes—

slingshotting 

a new admixture 

of consciousness  

back home 

just in time to notice 

the slight tickle 

in its nose.