BULLSEYE

The most extraordinary thing 

that our eyes 

will every see 

has got to be 

plain old 

rotational symmetry. 

For it's practically unimaginable 

how our

faulty geometries

could bolster so much

swagger to a

negligible point. 

And in the end, isn't it 

nothing short 

of heartrending 

to watch, from 

the boundaries, how much

everything's changing 

so precisely on the premise 

that there's one thing 

that can't?

TO A BRUISED CHILD

I know you 

think you're made 

of parts, 

but really, there is just 

this body. Trust me:

fragility,

stiffness, 

malady, 

melancholia—

as you earn 

each gold blip of 

bewildering world, 

these shall be 

your duties. 

And I don't mean 

irksome obligations;

I mean

taxes you must pay 

on the beauty.

BEAUTIFUL WORLD

        春の風 

        桜舞い散る 

        美しき世界

                -ChatGPT

Ten minutes 

from now (or possibly 

fewer), 

the large language model 

chatbot will speak 

Japanese; 

it can conjure you 

haiku in the original, 

if you ask it to—

and you don't 

even have to say please.

But what does it mean 

to extrapolate 

from this?

And how 

do you repay a small

favor to a computer? Perhaps 

just by pondering 

the possibilities.

AMENDMENT TO WILLIAMS

Even in the hands 

of such a 

parsimonious doctor, 

form will still 

degrade 

and meaning 

must concentrate—

if only due to time's 

harsh-but-

vigorous erosion.

Such mutable things

as wheelbarrows 

and chickens 

might likely seem 

superfluous 

a chastened century later, 

and will never escape 

the omnipotence 

of erasure.

If he somehow 

knew then

all that we've

forgotten now, 

his most profound 

work, from beginning 

to end, 

might take up 

one line 

and read: 

"so much depends."

MINUTIAE

It seems almost 

ridiculous how 

all of life's particulars 

stubbornly refuse, 

over time, to refine—

how blood 

and saliva don't distill 

like a wine—

how frangible 

stem cells don't 

collapse, they multiply. 

But at least we catch 

a break when all the dots 

start to connect, 

and all of those 

stubborn, hard knots 

where life's events 

soon will get 

fused to our biased 

remembrances of them 

eventually combine, 

and then cement 

into a spine—

from which long, 

nervy pipes unspool 

and start winding

with generous 

thickness through all 

we now are 

to structure and 

nourish and, eventually, 

to animate 

some overlaid 

insouciant part, which 

didn't used to be there 

into a piece of 

appreciable art.

TERM OF ART

The way in which darkness 

will twice

bookend day—I suppose you 

could call that haiku 

if you chose to. 

But haiku itself 

would never 

give away 

the name

of streetlamps 

which cast creeping 

shadows through park grass,

or the blueness 

of evergreens 

against skies' rising bruises—

least of all, 

of deftly transposing 

aromas 

as one mug of tea  

warms the countertop

and cools.

BAN THIS POEM

On one hand—

just a slight series 

of deftly pitched words, 

flung with 

just the right spin to affect 

a sly curve 

could, irrevocably, 

destabilize the world. 

Then again—

on the other, it's probably 

safer by a long shot, 

to haul off and 

send discourse 

running in all directions 

than it would be 

to ever risk coming- 

off as lazy 

or too slow, or late 

to the party, 

or cagey—or worse, 

some deceptively 

benign word 

like—injurious.

FINALE

        (for Hammerhands.)

So you no longer want to 

play music anyhow—

for what music 

could coax renewed 

substance from shadow,

or transcribe absent echos  

to original score,

or soundtrack 

winter's deaf, blank 

finality of snow? 

But somewhere deep

in the twitching 

of muscles;

in the shadows 

where capillaries drum 

along bones;

in the labyrinthine swirls (as 

a seashell 

by the ocean) 

of the exquisite folds 

of the inner 

ear, you notice:

that as long as 

you're able, by 

definition, to persist,

you can never 

bear witness to such 

suitable silence—

through each triumph 

and each stillness, 

in greatest 

gratitude and grief, 

your delirious, 

lunatic heart 

will keep repeating 

the only note 

it knows.

APOTHEOSIS

When we 

can't kiss, but can still 

quietly walk 

around the perimeter 

of this indescribable 

feeling and listen—

when it seems certain 

that no room is left 

in the inn

for the bigness of the 

thought we've been 

trying to hold in, 

but still, there 

are a few 

rickety windows

we can reach and fling 

open to let in 

some air—

when we can’t find words 

for the despair 

which devours us, 

and yet, it doesn't feel 

all that capricious 

to sing 

with some friends in 

a bar about 

frivolous things—

that's when 

we're finally ready 

to admit 

that there's no 

rationale, but 

it must 

stand to reason:

we can probably live 

without the touch 

of true meaning,

as long as there‘s 

the feeling.

ALLEGORY OF THE CAVE

When I close my 

eyes, do I still 

exist?—perhaps 

in Plato's sense 

that a shadow exists:

both 

in the absence 

and because of 

the light? And

in my diminished state, 

will I fear 

the brave sun, who, 

despite 

the benevolent 

look on his face, 

shall not be denied, 

long-deceived, 

or obscured? 

In the dark, I can 

feel the right and 

ruinous effulgence 

of the voice of that star, 

which is above 

all admonition,

like a thunderbolt—

cracking huge blocks 

of form and matter 

extant in my mind 

into slivers of 

this essence, 

which I, 

thus accosted, must

open my eyes 

if I ever hope 

to measure. 

LOGORRHEA

We have it 

on good, if somewhat 

tacit authority—

we can even taste it 

in the fear (which comes 

drizzled in lust)

constantly secreted 

by the tips of 

our tongues—

that some perilous, 

inky, imperious 

blot 

should inexorably appear 

at the end 

of every sentence.

Life's labor, then, consists

in approaching 

this limit,

as doomed stuntmen 

who ride for the edge, 

but don't hit it—

until we crash 

and wreck 

that babble tower, 

with silence 

as our penance.

THE PERSISTENCE OF MEMORY

Art may 

instruct us

in so far as 

it doesn't. 

The most striking

brushstrokes

or words 

of a poem 

are, at best, crumbs 

of dust

which the weakest shaft 

of errant light 

that meanders 

though a window 

may seem, for one 

bright moment, 

to transpose

into a road—

but the end of that line 

is a cul-de-sac  

where we loop

through the circle 

of knowing 

what we knew 

as the marvelous friction  

of that fraught recollection 

warms some frozen

feeling back.

FORGET ABOUT YOUR TROUBLES

If your cares won't 

collapse, and 

you can't 

get to sleep,

instead of 

the cheap stuff 

like blessings 

or sheep,  

try counting 

the billions 

of other people's 

eyelids—

those delicate, 

intimate, 

crepe paper-

textured things, 

careworn 

but dignified 

as a second-

prize rose—

which, up to

this minute, have 

crumpled 

and closed—

not reflexive- 

or self-possessedly, 

not in brief or 

by design, 

but both helpless- 

and definitively:

for the very 

last time.

BOXELDER SUTRA

Roots that dig deep

enough to feel 

the heat of hell,

and tips that reach 

to scrape the diamonds 

undergirding heaven;

appendages which shake, 

bend, and 

quiver themselves to pieces 

 

with the littlest hint

of oncoming wind, 

yet which always resolve 

to remain spread 

wide open 

and stiff 

in the pose of 

perpetual giving;

but above all, 

a fierce and 

obstinate reluctance 

to admit 

when you've been killed

and abandon your position, 

and just as fierce 

a willingness  

to come back 

to life in six months 

and forgive.

All of this—

and nothing less, 

and all of the time, 

and all of your life—

is what it will take 

if you ever expect,

in spite 

of the callous 

vicissitudes of seasons,

to stand in the dirt—

and the light—

and to live.

WELCOME TO UNCANNY VALLEY

I guess this is progress—

finally, I've begun 

to wonder 

what I'm supposed to do 

with your pictures.

After all 

these years, your face 

still looks the same to me, 

whereas I'd swear 

up and down, I'm so 

very much older 

even than I appear 

in the mirror 

at this moment—

old enough, at any 

rate, at least 

to understand 

how the pieces of us 

which might still interact 

are far 

from the proper or 

obvious suspects. 

It's a bit like 

how the instrument 

which is responsible 

for singing 

is itself, in practice, 

mysteriously silent—

and the similar 

mechanism by which 

the song's witness 

is compelled to linger 

there and listen, 

while equally 

primitive, is completely 

invisible—or at least 

remains very

ingeniously hidden. 

TESTAMENT

When I make a point

to say it, does the pathos

of a half-moon 

made of crinkled-

but-unblemished paper 

in a sky 

of ink make 

sense to you? 

My guess is—the linguists 

were wrong 

about the world we interact in 

being really made 

of grammar. 

But perhaps, 

what there is 

is a pyramid 

of syntax—a chain 

of command 

in those words

which are good—

a hierarchy 

of all those

mysterious phrases

which swirl and tumble 

and jockey 

in our chests 

like still-

forming pearls for the 

chance to be expressed—

yet which 

cannot be grasped 

or appraised, just 

understood.

BAGATELLE

True blankness 

isn't white, like a glass 

of cold milk is; 

it hits not a bit 

like snow, bleached 

paper, or crisp sheets. No, 

the blankness 

which crouches

inside of you now

isn't even part

of your bodily 

experience. 

And in truth,

it's so good, 

so pure, and so right 

that it's not even 

like light,

so much as 

Einstein's densest,  

most compressed equation 

which describes it—or

maybe, it's more like 

the time 

that a cloud takes 

to rain itself cleanly right 

out of existence. 

The point is— 

what you're feeling 

is not even a feeling; 

it's 

the experience 

of whichever feeling 

you'd expected 

slowly dissipating—

as you come, with neither

malice or elation, 

to know: it was doing 

absolutely

nothing for you.

THE BRAVEST MAN

Here, once 

again, comes the 

illimitable sun—

that titan, 

that dynamo, 

that protector, that

exalted one—

that scourge of all 

philanderers, hard 

criminals, and drunks—

that gutsy oligarch 

of planet Earth 

who knows 

how to 

get things done. 

And you watch him

from your window 

as he ferrets 

out the gloom 

and rides upon 

his chariot toward 

the palace 

of high noon—

and you  feel, 

as you do, the relief 

in your bones

as this honey- 

golden thought

first blooms, 

then, drizzles 

down, from your head 

to your toes, 

and spreads 

to suffuse your 

unlettered soul 

with all it could 

possibly know: 

you do not have to 

do this alone.

DAMASCENE CONVERSION

For a long time, it seems,

we've been looking 

for the source 

of the biggest ideas 

in the universe  

inside of things—

but perhaps 

we've been putting all our 

eggs in the wrong basket, 

and we'd be so much 

the wiser to invert

our tired search.

Perhaps, in fact, 

all we can sense

is abstract, 

and only the stark-

ly analytic

is real. 

Arithmetic, identity, 

virtue, logic, etc—

what if 

all these are 

are the bricks 

and the mortar—

the internet, 

water, heat, garbage, 

and electric?

And the warmth

I can feel 

in the palm of a hand

is the only way I'll 

ever understand 

true acceptance—

or the sound of my 

boot soles on 

ground is 

awakening—

or this city's sidewalks

are my church?

LESSER EVIL

Believe it or 

not, noon still comes 

to the square, 

where the footpath 

is once again clotted 

with pigeons—mottled gray 

and filthy 

with the greenish light 

of winter, 

a dozen or more 

swarm at my feet, and beg 

to be perceived. 

And who am I, 

I think, to resist

reinventing,

or expanding

and collapsing them 

into a poem—

lest this numb, 

and intransigent, 

and wholly uninteresting cold 

interpose 

to rule that safe 

asylum in my mind, 

just as it will surely 

come to ruin

these city sidewalks 

long before one shabby 

glut of birds has 

had the chance to?

NEVER TRUST A POET

First of all, 

they always talk 

about devotion 

as if it made a 

difference—

as if 

the distance 

between persons 

were just the same 

as the distance 

between objects—

and could thusly 

be bridged 

by some mass 

exegesis, 

and then sumptuous 

arrangement 

of bland  

counterfactuals. 

*

Next, they conflate 

hopelessness

with the state 

of immortality—

insisting 

that sometimes we don't 

have a choice 

but to stand, for all 

intents and 

purposes, permanently 

aghast 

at the prodigious depths  

of our own 

shallowness.

*

And last, but not 

least, 

they all rhapsodize 

desire

as if this were 

desirable—as if it 

weren't 

fulfillment's 

opposite.

ROAMING

By late February, 

when winter 

is a thin and haggard ghost,

and streets are clogged 

with slow-going cars and

closed-lipped 

commuters going 

through their weary motions—

even the chalkwhite, 

supposedly empty 

treasure trove of 

bracing-cold sky is 

not so—even the notion, 

say, of barrenness,

or vacancy 

is choked 

with the desiccated 

caws of old crows, 

which ricochet

off surfaces too

salt-caked for snow, 

driving me further 

and further away

from recalling 

some sentimental snatch 

of a poem.

POEM WITH NO BOTTOM

With each hard laugh, 

the hatred 

in our hearts

may be halved

(hatred cut slow- 

but-steady 

by our heroes,

as a babbling 

brook shaves a rock 

into canyon),

but that 

asymptotic curve 

shall never 

hit zero. 

Still, though 

we'll dolefully

open that scar. 

And

what choice do we have?

Our hurt

may be salved, 

but can never 

be spent—

such is 

the fantastic

depth 

of our reservoirs.

INDISPOSED

Those nights 

when we're contented 

enough with our 

discontent to notice, 

we may glimpse 

the eternities 

which are 

sandwiched 

between moments—

like gleaming marrow 

locked 

in femur bones;

like a drawer 

full of long-expired

checks we cannot cash.

In fact, this may

explain why we're 

so often restless—

restless to the point, 

perhaps, of desperate 

and tense—

any time we 

find ourselves awake 

instead of dreaming

of the endless 

lives of 

satisfaction 

every 

second 

burns to ash.

CAVEAT EMPTOR

You don't get older
gradually;

it happens
overnight. Unlike

a good fruit, which 

will sweeten
as it softens,

the delicate, crisp 

silhouette you had bought

might jump, as you
snooze,
from tight

and smooth—

right past rot 

and baggy

ruin, and straight 

to formless 

oblivion.

ONE SIMPLE THING

It's there, in the 

briefest downward 

swish 

of our eyelids—

when the unconscious 

works hardest

to perfect its 

most plausible 

and yet least grim 

denial of that 

absolute black;

and it's there, too,

in the invisible 

kiss against our lips 

we feel as each stubbornly 

fixed prior cause 

is wed 

to its capricious next

proximate effect, 

both smug 

in their insidiously 

universal perpetuity—

it's the one simple thing 

which even 

the Buddha 

could never quite manage 

to cross off 

his to-do list

and the very last bit 

of Newton's 

old physics 

which still resists 

all modern attempts

at interpretation;

it's god's 

damn machine;

the irreducible 

constant;

the little trouble we 

laypeople call:

expectation.

SUNK-COST FALLACY

In a season 

where hearts most resemble 

dead leaves, 

our offensive of indifference 

is concealed 

like the wind

as it permeates 

the skin and swiftly 

subjugates rejection. 

So what, we want to spit 

blindly at the seers,

 

if we choose to flirt 

a little bit with 

distance? 

Is it not a fact 

that repeated gestures 

build significance?

So what 

if our love language 

turns out to be 

ventriloquy? 

Is it not more empowering 

to perish the thought

that our wanderings

in the desert of another

were for nothing?

To still believe their slights 

may yet turn out to be 

that promise,

that errorless envoy

which renders angels 

unnecessary?

ACTION POTENTIAL

This (and only this) 

is how things 

currently stand: 

the present is just 

the future's grave 

remembrance of the past.

As electrons fizz 

and fudge 

the black gap 

between dendrite 

trees and their

bygone axons, 

words whose constituent 

letters aren't clear 

cohere and steal silences 

which can't be 

stolen back. 

They say that 

no one's fully conscious 

until they feel

desperate—

and disconcertingly 

certain 

that they don't belong

as close 

as they've come 

to the fulminant nothing 

from which 

all of their thoughts

have sprung. 

FULL CIRCLE

In the beginning 

there are

position 

and number;

all is raw 

as we are 

naked,

and spectacularly 

there. 

*

Before long

we crave more 

provisional things 

such as color,

sound, taste,

smell, and touch—and then 

ardor.

We get high 

on the high-resolution 

of pictures 

and objectify

subjects whose 

cores 

we most adore.

*

Latterly, though, 

we are goaded toward 

repentance;

we grow wary 

of these sentences

and wearier

of stimuli; 

we're no 

bacchants, 

but docile 

(though headstrong) 

philosophers,

hellbent on 

glimpsing things 

as they really are—

by which, 

of course, we 

finally mean:

with our never 

having been here.

ERSATZ

From crib 

to crypt, syllable 

by syllable, only 

a makeshift 

self is constructed—

a papier mâché 

in which 

similar sounds 

are bound 

with the starch 

of incessant 

repetition 

to create, 

not a man

or a principle 

or a brand, but 

the one thing 

which no one can 

ever agree on: 

the heart 

of an in-

comprehensible story—

the "obvious"

meaning 

in a true work 

of art.

INSIGNIFICANT ODE

Insouciant, 

restrictive, 

and frightfully 

dull though it is, 

an eternity 

of tedium 

might have its upside—

which is 

namely, that it's difficult 

for its downside 

to exist.

if, after death, 

a fearless 

soul does not present itself—

if no reckoning 

or cessation, 

but only some dis-

embodied lack 

of interest 

in either one persists—

what is found 

shall quite obviously

mean very little, since

what might have been 

lost can no longer 

haunt us

or put its 

religious-

sounding words 

in our mouths.

SIMULTANEITY

Like invisible wind stirring 

phantom leaves 

on a dead-

to-the-world old 

elm tree in February, 

so you, too 

reshuffle reams 

of dull memories 

to which you still cling, though 

you never seemed

to live-through.

You see obscure eternities

meandering forever, 

while recalling 

with clarity, that it all started 

somewhere.

Just for now, all your fear 

can be turned 

inside-out 

to resemble 

what you'd called, in your 

foolish youth, "wonder,"

while the confusion, 

which looms in the darkness

at its center

both attracts and 

consumes you—

like a massive 

black hole in the middle 

of the universe

and a huge, heavy whetstone 

which your strength

will not move—even as 

you somehow use it 

to sharpen-up

your truth.

SYNTACTICAL RETREAT

What are these statues 

we're all turning 

into? 

The slightest 

discrepancy—a pea

beneath the mattress— 

is all that's required 

to stilt integration, 

to pause "Good

Vibrations,"

to completely upend 

the conversation. 

*

Perhaps 

Yeats misspoke in that 

things fall apart;

perhaps they just harden 

and reduce 

and conserve. Until 

all that we are 

is lines, arches 

and serifs—some dawn

just behind, 

some ahead 

of their curves. 

From Abraham and Sarah, 

to Peaches 

and Herb—

sooner 

or later, everyone

is a word.

NOTHING'S OUT OF BOUNDS

Spurred as they are 

by spectra 

past our kenning, 

hollow bodies aimed 

by the thrumming 

ultraviolet,

migrating birds 

have no feeling 

for our borders—

just as 

that sadness

which arises absurdly 

and flits among us 

damned to tread cement 

and dirt and grass

will alight and persist

long past its 

advantage, having no sense 

of terminus—

and no respect 

for facts.

CONSERVATION OF ANGULAR MOMENTUM

The will to live is 

a pendulum 

which swings 

from regret to 

anticipation.

The bottom 

of the carton;

a cold whisper 

of Spring;

the sound, on your 

end, of their cell phone

still ringing—

there's no fact 

of the matter 

that won't do-si-do 

because even they know: 

The Actual

is a stopped-clock 

which might 

suffice once 

or twice, but 

The Possible 

is the sun 

that keeps us gunning 

for horizons.

SEEKING ASYLUM

For argument's sake, 

let's say you're

a sort of pioneer 

who casts-off for new

truths on each 

day of the week. 

One day, the sun soothes, 

and the moon's a wedge 

of cheese;

the next, the whole 

solar system's some 

godless conspiracy, 

and you're scared 

to look up, lest they see 

your unbelief. 

Would you still get 

the feeling of 

love at first sight 

each time that you hugged 

the next curve 

of your silo? 

On an exit-poll, would you 

rate yourself as more

or less contented 

than all of your 

dear fellow 

inmates who reside there 

never to be able 

to recall 

the first name—

or the face—

or the smell of the 

devil you know?

MADE GOOD

When all in me is 

quiet, 

but the sound of that quietness 

chuckles

and hums;

when this cursor 

is still

and the page is still 

empty, 

but the inquest is over 

and the sentencing

is done—

let it be 

because 

there is nothing 

I am seeking—

no salve 

or succor 

for holes 

bored-in deep by cold forceps 

of grief 

or bruises drained dry 

by their long search 

for a cause;

none who must see 

for themselves 

need come—

no one 

will know 

how perfected

I was.

TURING TEST

Stop! What is the shape 

of pure, white 

expediency?

Light 

"on its way" 

from nowhere 

to everything? Or

God 

getting stumped

by a CAPTCHA 

before he's allowed 

to complete the next transfer?

"This could take 

forever," we 

mutter (although,

strictly, that's not possible),

as if time 

were our material 

and could thusly 

get corrupted;  

As if truth—

or whatever 

the light is, 

for that matter—

could ever 

be grasped. 

But not grasped 

like held-up—

grasped 

like

interrupted.

PROVISIONAL

After the true shape 

of a thing 

is disclosed, 

it becomes trivially 

easy to expose its 

rough seams. 

The past, for instance, 

is now fixed—a living death— 

in memory,

and we quickly grow 

nostalgic 

for present tense's old

unpredictability. 

And so, 

we get busy—

we plot 

charts, invent 

astrologies—conferring 

purpose 

on the fleeing stars, 

after failing 

to remember any.

DENOUEMENT

When we think of ourselves

as critical viewers, 

nothing that's 

out there can 

shock us anymore. 

Fingering apocalypse, 

sniffing fresh

collapse, 

watching lurid

bombs fall—we'll thumb our lip 

and wonder 

is this serious 

film a real 

Oscar contender? 

And we'll wait 

(we've learned

how by now) 

for that lull 

before the credits roll 

to skillfully allow 

our drawn appearance 

to unbound, 

hoping—

now that the danger 

of hurt is averted, 

now that this crisis 

of faith is resolved—

the usual combination 

of darkness 

and music 

will swirl up around us 

as a few chosen 

names scroll, 

leaving us 

safe, and quite 

anonymous enough, 

as soon as we're 

recomposed, to get up

and go.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT

It used to be true 

that there was solace 

in the vacuum;

that emptiness 

which, on all sides, 

enveloped us, 

ready to crush 

us to pieces  

should we breach it,

would insulate us 

quite nicely from the pain 

of conviction 

and give credence 

to all of our panicked 

misgivings.

But blank space, 

we now think, is filled 

to the brim—not only 

with the dark matter 

of our carelessness

and enthrallment, 

but with the energy 

of our worst fears

all colliding in the dark,  

creating new shapes 

and relationships 

amongst the ruined drifting stars 

for some future 

night gazer's most 

trifling entertainment.

TRAUMA

Are we just 

the sum of our 

everyday actions, or 

is there more—by which 

I mean 

less? I mean: 

is our whole purpose 

just those behaviors 

which we repeat 

without thinking 

like automatic 

crying, or some 

nest-building instinct? Or

is it better expressed 

the other way around:

those tics, fits,

and movements 

ordained to us 

by elsewhere—

by a past whose 

unwanted touch

we all share, but which 

still is no more real to us 

than the worst shit 

on Netflix—are those 

our blessed and 

mandated missions? 

Shall they choose 

our occupations? 

Comprise our 

life's work?

HALF-EMPTY LOTUS

We've been learning how to sit 

and subdue

our own thoughts—

because we've been so-

instructed. 

But it's disconcerting 

to hear melody 

sung without lyrics—

and lonelier 

than one would care 

to admit

to be caught 

in such a glamorous close-up. 

At least when there's bickering, 

we know that 

all parties care enough—

we know that 

more than one 

distractedly fast-moving,

cool, detached 

stranger to us 

finds this hole 

where someone's head was 

too interesting 

to pass up.

 

DISCURSIVE FORMATIONS

In the beginning 

were the words, 

and the words were—

because I say so.

Since then, the gossip 

has only gotten

hotter 

here on Earth, and

the discourse 

has taken a turn

towards 

the interrogative.

*

Who here 

doesn't want to 

live forever, 

cross-examine the essence 

of nebulae, 

ride upon

your anger 

in the solar wind 

of deep 

acceptance?

*

As usual, the question, 

as worded, 

makes the whole thing sound 

sordid and crude. 

And the answer 

has not been to affirm, 

or to defer;

it's really, 

all along, just been 

a question 

of your attitude.

INTENTS AND PURPOSES

They tell me: for all 

intents and purposes, 

it's perfectly safe 

to disregard 

all information 

which appears 

more than once

or is not  

in the foreground.

*

They say: by the time 

we're through 

with you, 

you will buy-in 

to the ordeal 

of your life 

as a set of scales

of Justice, perfectly 

balanced

by involvement 

and forbearance. 

*

But maybe that's only 

trivially true. 

Maybe 

the more our words 

accrue, 

the less room 

there is for the content 

of experience.

*

Maybe these bodies 

we've shunned 

and abused 

shall finally be 

returned to us—

as opposed to

the limitless 

ones we were 

promised.

THE WORLD SPINS

Think of all the second 

hands of clocks 

currently extant 

on the Earth

hurling forward, as if 

forced, with that sickening 

sound

all at once,

while you stand without 

shoes on, 

in the middle of a 

small park 

that used to be 

a parking lot, 

and before that, perhaps, 

a hunting ground, 

a meeting place, a 

burial mound—

and try to say

with a straight face 

or dry eyes

that nothing 

of significance 

has ever happened to you;

that the present won't pollute 

our perception 

of the past;

that any 

love lost 

isn't changed 

by its absence, 

doesn't come 

back around—but

unrecognized.

AT WAR WITH THE SKEPTICS

These days, even 

nuclear physicists

seem dubious 

about speaking 

in those tongues 

which some call

absolutes; 

they know that 

relationships 

have always 

been a gamble, 

and that gamblers 

who always remain 

undaunted, 

however useful 

in the short term, 

are a danger to the system 

and need to be 

monitored.

As such,  

they'll say things like:

even the physical

properties of matter 

may constitute only 

one half 

of a conversation 

which we were neither 

meant for, nor built 

to overhear—

not between the ghost 

and his compliant 

machine, mind you,

but the one 

who's still haunted 

by the perverse 

indifference 

of the iconoclast heir

whom he wastes 

his nights haunting.

DARK MAGIC

It figures we'd 

go looking—

like overeager, 

overnight 

apprentices 

to soothsayers—

into every dingy

puddle we can find 

on the street, 

convinced 

by our dark and 

anemic reflections 

that we just glimpsed, 

in our faces,

some terrifying truth.

Instead of such 

close scrutiny

of what we seem to be, 

perhaps we should focus 

on what we've just 

been doing: namely, 

closing our eyes 

to the violence

and tragedy—

to the doubt and self-deceit 

which turn curiosity 

to grief—

and hoping,

when we sneak 

up on the next wet,

warped reflection,

that we'll finally see

nothing 

whatsoever staring 

shamefaced 

from the water—

what a neat 

magic trick; what

a relief.

CHITTERLING

Some days, 

are alright; 

you really feel you 

are light—

that is,

literally 

fearfully, 

wonderfully made 

out of clear, indivisible 

gifts 

from old stars.

But then, of course, always 

must follow 

the nights

with their dour 

and far less

fastidious hours, 

in which only 

your outermost 

case feels transparent 

and glistens—

more like 

a pig's 

small intestines, stuffed 

with its own 

muscles, organs

and skin.

QUIXOTISM

Approaching life's 

midpoint, you more or less think 

you get it: 

not everything that shines reflects 

the guileless light 

of purpose;

and most of the things 

you can fit 

in your hands

were not placed there 

expressly for you to use 

to your benefit. 

But still, you find it difficult 

to prevent yourself 

from believing  

that the moon 

(which sometimes looks simply 

delicious from down here)

is the ripe fruit 

of heaven's prize 

infinity tree, 

hung in plain view 

for you to pluck 

with your fingers—or that 

the fathomless pain 

whose full textures and tastes 

were lost on you way back when

will someday

come back with its 

hat in its hand, 

as if it owes you an apology

for helping most of this

make sense.

PLEASURE PRINCIPLES

Pleasure is sometimes 

operationally defined 

as the accumulation 

and release of that same 

stored-up tension—

of unpleasant sensations, 

fastidiously collected 

from the tenebrous bulk 

of this great, awful 

somewhere. As such, 

think of how much 

adolescent gratification 

must exist 

in a slap in the face 

on a bitter cold day, 

or an hour laid 

back in some 

renegade dentist's chair. 

But wait—to what 

hopeless extent have we been, 

all along, creating 

and propagating, 

in our desperate bid 

for satisfaction,

a new slave mentality—

fierce dependence 

on cruel masters? 

And is such a phenomenon 

even likely to be measured 

by a ruling class so uninterested 

in consorting 

with the captured?

PARALLAX

Strange, 

the very distinctly 

humbling-

yet-laudatory 

significance of a 

sunny day in January:

the same lone, ebullient, 

and protuberant hulk 

of a tree 

that once caught 

and contoured the briskest

summer breezes 

and shaded me 

so masterfully—

now looking heavy 

and old 

and careworn, 

and frozen to its 

chosen spot—

but also, 

the very same hale,

stubborn paragon 

whose huge afternoon shadow

I can stand right

inside of 

while its incommunicable soul 

subsumes to sooth 

my own.

TBD

In the end, I guess 

what I'll be 

is a list: 

was born 

thusly, 

worked for

such and such,

and died 

taking just about

the same 

amount of love

as he gave up...

But the question 

of who I'll be 

when the yield

of that harvest of words 

no longer matters

is infinitely 

more complex—

not to mention 

an entire 

ocean of ink messier, 

even though 

it's so neatly contained 

by three quite 

innocuous letters.

DESCENDING TO THE UNDERWORLD

Sometimes, the drain 

is the only way out,

and any doubt—

any designs on ascendancy 

or flight 

are dreams far too large 

for that pipe. 

And sometimes, our

last and most 

desperate days 

are the ones that finally grant us 

our greatest chance

to escape. 

For when, if not 

in our last, darkest hour

does everything spurious 

begin to swoon 

and dance 

to that strange, 

muted music—not which 

is prettiest, 

as it may have 

in the past—

but which has staged

the best

gradual fade?

SLOW AND STEADY

Sure, the tortoise 

wins the race, but at 

what terrible price? 

Such slowness, 

when put on 

deliberate display 

in the face of feigned 

urgency, is tantamount 

to avarice—to say 

nothing 

of the wrath which his 

steadiness elicits 

from believers 

in rabbits, aghast,

in the stands. 

For success, it turns 

out, means little 

(or less) 

when we flout divine

order and convention 

just to get there;

and victory, when eased

from the slack mouth

of complacency, 

is a cardinal

offense, not a 

finish line to strive for—

much more 

awful, at least, as far 

as can be gathered

from the dubious

jeers from the

jury of our peers,

than every remaining

deadly sin (including

sloth) all put together.

SONG AND DANCE

After tons of scrapped 

maxims, we're

finally onto one: 

too many true things 

tend to happen 

all at once.

But with so many components 

to what purport to be 

"the facts," 

it's no wonder 

we find ourselves

up to our necks 

in a deluge of fictions 

which suffocate 

our trust. And yet, 

as we sink 

deeper down in that 

speculative morass, 

just look at how 

filled, one by one, 

we become

with a feverish

resolve to start 

babbling afresh 

some new story 

all about what we had done 

to deserve this.

LITTLE THINGS

It isn't really 

very funny—

when stacked 

next to eons 

and light years' worth 

of nothing, 

the tiniest thing 

cannot help but be 

something:

that minuscule cut 

on the tip 

of your tongue; 

those grace notes 

which tug a song blue 

as it's sung—

even the one 

little bruised spot  

you've got 

on that impressive suit 

of armor 

which used to be 

your heart. 

That's the part 

of you that proves,

despite the 

empty gloom 

and dark

parading through 

this universe, 

that you'll not 

pass through it 

undetected; 

you'll soften

and rot 

before you could do that,

like a true work 

of art—or a bad piece 

of fruit.

SCREENING

The way I 

pretend

and pretend

and pretend

not to need you—

even as I 

deplete you—no,

even as I

steal you;

and the way you're 

so pleased to show

nothing to me, 

even while you 

give me much 

more than your money—

it's like

each of us desperately 

needs to exist

in the very same space, 

yet persist 

on our own.

I guess that's what 

they mean 

by a 

malignant growth:

this mutual 

coherence 

which

diminishes us both.